Cage of Darkness
by Quill of Molliemon
Summary: AU. OT era, postESB to RotJ. Darth Vader suffers an accident in his TIE fighter, and when he wakes up he's...a traitor to the Empire? He was saved by the Rebels? And now he's in Princess Leia's custody? Oh this could get really ugly...
1. The Accident

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Star Wars. I earn no money from the writing and posting of this. I am quite poor. Therefore, don't sue me!

**Author's Notes:** Firstly, the most important thing to know is this: **DO NOT EXPECT THIS STORY TO UPDATE WITH ANY REGULARITY!** This is, at best, a side project, and will only update when time and inspiration strike me. Misunderstood V2 and Exile are my _top priority_ and will remain so. I do have several chapters already written, but once I've posted them, it could be MONTHS before anything new appears.

Secondly, this is an AU set in the Original Trilogy (Episodes 4, 5, & 6). Specifically, it falls between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi in the first few chapters before jumping ahead into what is roughly Return of the Jedi territory.

Thirdly, on old version of this is posted on my LiveJournal. I'll be editing what I have already written so, while the initial chapter or two will be pretty much the same, the later chapters will be significantly different.

And fourthly, this story is similar to plenty of other stories out there, most notably Remade, My Daughter, and Memoires of the Chosen One by TheRealThing (which I highly recommend, go read them if you haven't already!), but I assure I'm not ripping it, or any of the others off with this. I actually started writing this story BEFORE I started the original version of Misunderstood. That was nearly TWO YEARS AGO. So I swear, the plot of this story came entirely from my own head, and any similarities to anything else are purely coincidental.

Now, sit back and enjoy!

* * *

**Chapter 1  
**_The Accident_

An agitated Dark Lord of the Sith is a very bad thing. Those who displease the irate Dark Lord, or even have the simple misfortune to be nearby and lack an obvious purpose, tend to die rather painfully. Even those who have an important function and place can still fall victim to the annoyed Lord's wrath if they display the right amount of incompetence. When a Sith Lord is angry, people generally start to die. This is a known fact to any who serve in the Imperial military. Most especially those who serve under Darth Vader himself.

Admiral Thomas Piett was one who was quite experienced in the many dangerous moods of the Dark Lord Vader. He owed his very rank to Vader's wrath. The late Admiral Kendal Ozzel had been an arrogant egotist and a fool. He thought he was above them all, even Lord Vader (though he never said so out loud and certainly not within said Dark Lord's hearing), and he had the misfortune to make one mistake too many. Vader killed the pompous buffoon with a simple gesture and bumped Piett up to fill the rank. Piett had held on to his new position by possessing the one major quality that Ozzel had lacked: competence. Knowing when to shut up and melt into the background helped too.

Lately, after the failure at Cloud City on Bespin, Piett had been fading into the scenery more and more. The Admiral had been certain that when the _Millennium Falcon_ had vanished into hyperspace before the tractor beam had locked on that Vader would kill him. He'd killed Ozzel for less, so his death had seemed assured. But strangely Vader had simply stalked off the bridge and sealed himself in his quarters for the rest of the day. From then on Vader had been less predictable than he normally was, hence Piett's fading into the background.

Now Piett stood near the rear of the _Executor_'s bridge (lower level) and busied himself by hovering by a bridge technician's shoulder. Nothing was really happening on or in the vicinity of the Super Star Destroyer _Executor_, but the Admiral was down here hovering to avoid his commander, the Dark Lord. While Darth Vader held no official military rank, he was to be obeyed by anyone and everyone unless one of his orders conflicted with one of the Emperor's orders. And Vader's orders carried a special weight here because this ship had been awarded to the Sith Lord by the Emperor, making the _Executor_ very nearly Vader's property, his domain. Here, more than anywhere else, Darth Vader was God.

Admiral Piett willed himself not to flinch when Vader entered the bridge (upper level). The sinister hiss-rasp of Vader's frightening black breathing mask made the hair on the back of Piett's neck stand on end, but he did not turn away from the screen he was so intently studying. Unless Vader called for him, there was no need to draw attention to himself. If luck was on his side today Vader would ignore him and either leave quickly or Piett's shift would end without incident and let him escape to his personal quarters. Today fortune smiled upon him.

The terrifying specter that was Darth Vader hovered on the bridge (upper level) for several long minutes. Then, seemingly satisfied with what he saw, he left again. The instant the door hissed shut behind him there was a universal sigh of relief. The tension, which had been palpable when Vader had been present, drained away to almost nothing. While Piett did not appear visibly affected by Vader's visit, his internal reaction was the same as the rest of the bridge crew.

_Survived again. Now if only I can decide if that's a good thing or not…_

* * *

Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, was not in a good mood. This was not unusual in the least. For him, a good mood was the unusual state. The moods that were most common in him were angry, furious, irritated, depressed, lonely, and numb. He would never admit to anyone (not even himself) that he experienced the last three, but he still did. And since he was perpetually in a poor mood, the only thing that varied was the intensity of it. If he was very angry, people tended to die. If he was only mildly angry, then his crew was mostly safe from his wrath. Mostly. 

Right now he was in an intensely bad mood and his veteran crew knew it. As he stormed down the halls of his Super Star Destroyer, _Executor_, the ship's residents scattered from his presence like Freighter Roaches scattering for cover when a light was turned on. Through the Force he could feel their fear of him. It swirled around him like a frozen wind and lashed at his soul like icy sea-spray. Their fear and their reactions only fueled his terrifying rage.

Vader strode into his private quarters, locked his door, and began to pace about angrily. He stalked from one wall to the other in the spacious main room that contained his meditation and maintenance chamber. For once he wished he had some furniture in here because he would really like to throw things around or smash them. He always could leave his quarters and seek out some lowly crew members to kill, but he forced himself to refrain from such behavior.

Months earlier during his obsessive hunt for his son he'd gone on a crew killing spree of sorts. He had no regrets concerning his slaying of Admiral Ozzel. The man had been incompetent and highly irritating and his foolish move during the approach on Hoth had been the last straw. But his strangling of Captain Needa he _did_ regret. Needa had been reliable, competent, and responsible. It hadn't been his fault that the infuriating Captain Solo had managed to slip away from him. However his rage had flared up out of his control and before he realized it, Captain Needa had expired. Vader had no wish to make the same error again. Good help was simply too hard to come by in the Imperial military.

The black clamshell-like metal sphere of his meditation/maintenance chamber began to rattle and groan as Vader's rage disturbed the Force energies around him. _Force damn Kenobi! Damn him for everything! He held me back and held me down! He turned her against me, made me __**kill her**__! He took my legs, my left arm, and my lungs from me! He left me to die as he was professing to __**love me**__! He hid my son from me! Lied to him, poisoned him against me like he did to her! He warped my child so much that he would rather __**die**__ than stand beside me! I held out my hand and he chose the bottomless shaft below! Kenobi made him __**hate me**__! Hate me…_

Vader stopped pacing and slumped against a wall. The hot fiery rage drained away, leaving an aching icy void behind. It was always this way when his fury abandoned him. Each time the void grew larger as more and more of his soul was consumed by his rage. He wanted to sink to the floor and cry, but he could not afford to indulge in such weakness, not even in the privacy of his own quarters. He was a Dark Lord of the Sith, he had no heart to have broken and cry over like a weak child.

His son had rejected him. His own flesh and blood had spurned him and his offer of power. His child had leapt away down the chasm in the bowels of Cloud City instead of taking his father's hand like he should have. He'd told Luke the truth and the young Rebel had treated it like it signaled the end of the galaxy. True Vader had maimed the boy, hacked his hand off to disarm him, but hands could be replaced. And so what if he'd tortured his 'friends', they were Rebel scum with no real value and could easily be replaced as well. With the power that Vader had offered him, anything was possible, yet Luke refused to see that.

All he saw were the lies that the Rebels filled his head with, the lies that the last Jedi (Kenobi, damn him!) told him. All Luke saw was an evil entity that needed to be overthrown, a dragon to be slain. He saw nothing but corruption and darkness and sought to bring an end to it. He saw all these things in anything of the Empire, especially Vader, but this was simply not true. The corruption was the Emperor's doing, not Vader's. Vader wanted to end it and the Rebellion and bring peace and order to the galaxy. He'd told Luke so and still the boy remained blinded and delusional. He threw his life away instead of accepting his proper place by his father's side.

That hurt Vader. It hurt him far more than it should. It incited in him both boundless rage and deep despair. It fed his desire to kill and his wish to die and escape the pain once and for all. It shattered his focus and birthed doubts and confusions. It had him reeling and he had yet to regain his balance.

Desperate for some clarity, Vader straightened up and left his chambers. He strode purposefully down to the main hanger. A flight would settle him down. Flying always helped. His last joy, his last freedom. No one could take that from him. Not Kenobi or any of the Jedi, not the Rebels, not even his Master.

When he reached the hanger bay, he waited impatiently for his personal fighter to be prepared. His TIE had none of the weaknesses of the mass-produced craft that the rest of his fighter pilots flew. Every spare moment that he had he'd spent modifying his TIE fighter. It had shields that could easily shrug off any Rebel fighter's energy weapons, it was capable of firing up to six proton torpedoes, and it was hyper capable. His TIE was the perfect fighter and it was bliss to fly it in or out of combat.

Vader smothered his impatient eagerness and slowly entered his craft. Calmly and deliberately he lifted off and sailed into the black void of space. Dark Lords of the Sith did not dive into their cockpits and blast off with reckless abandon unless they are forced to by the need to get into battle. It was imperative that he preserve his image for his crew. But once he was clear of the shadow of his mighty ship _Executor_ he was free to fly as he pleased. And he pleased to fly fast and loose.

He accelerated to near dangerous levels, rocketing out into the void like a madman. Vader snapped his TIE into tight spins, dizzying rolls, and nauseating combinations of maneuvers. Few pilots could hope to match his skill in the cockpit and it brought him some faint, grim satisfaction. No doubt his fighter pilots and off-duty crew were finding some screen where they could watch him perform. Watching him fly like this was probably the only time that they were glad that he was on their side.

Just as Vader was really starting to unwind and calm his flight path a little, everything went down the tubes. A cluster of fighters, not TIEs, abruptly dropped out of hyperspace right on top of him. They were clearly Rebels and he could sense their panic. They had no idea that the _Executor_ was here and had probably believed this barren system to be…well, barren.

Vader snarled and tried to extricate himself from the middle of their squadron, but the panicking Rebels lost formation. His modified TIE nearly crashed into three separate X-wings as they swarmed around him. He fired several shots at what he determined to be the leader, but that pilot had gathered his wits enough to raise his shields. With a few Huttese curses Vader managed to break out of the Rebel fighter swarm only to be clipped by a blast from an X-wing pilot with an itchy trigger finger.

While the energy blast did little surface damage to his TIE, it wreaked havoc on multiple internal systems. The control stick nearly froze up in his hands as the view outside the cockpit started to spin crazily. Alarms screamed and warning lights flashed. Vader tried to raise the _Executor_ on his comm but he didn't even get any static, it was fried. The dual ion engines made horrible groaning noises underneath the constant shriek that they normally produced and the fighter bucked around him. And then the hyper-drive spontaneously activated, the stars stretched out into long beams, and then he found himself streaking through the white-blue mists of hyper-space.

Normally flight in hyper-space was a smooth affair, the only jolting felt was during the transition in and out of it. Tumbling end over end through hyper-space was most definitely not normal. Vader clenched his teeth and struggled to reach the controls, but the pressure from the tumbling and progressive failure of the inertial dampers prevented his mechanical hands from reaching the sparking panels. The Dark Lord was at the mercy of his failing ship and he hated every nanosecond of it.

Then, just as suddenly as his ship lurched into light speed, it dropped back down to sub-light speed. The jolt was so incredible that his restraints snapped, sending him crashing forward into his control panels. Vader felt several important things go crunch and before he blacked out, he managed to form one final thought.

_Damn it, this is just not my day at all…_


	2. Salvage

**Chapter 2  
**_Salvage_

Kyle Katarn was bored. He was supposed to be scouting for locations for future Rebel bases. That's what he and his pilot, Jan Ors, were doing. They were out here on the edge of the Outer Rim sailing through the void in their ship, _Moldy Crow_. Here they cruised, surveying system after system, marking any that had potential for specialized survey crews to look into in depth later. And he was bored.

This particular star system was so remote and empty it only had a collection of numbers and letters to identify it on the few star charts that bothered to list it. It was a binary system with the twin stars a good light-year apart, allowing each to have their own set of planets. But the double star set-up caused orbital havoc with the outer planets as each star tried to steal its partner's distant worlds without losing any of its own. This made the system unstable and its lack of native life and important resources meant that no one gave a womp-rat's ass about it. Kyle couldn't say that he did either.

Jan was off duty and therefore sleeping so Kyle didn't have anyone to talk to, which only fed his boredom. He might've tried to take a nap, but it was his shift and it was his job to stand watch on the bridge while his ancient probe droids scanned the one semi-habitable planet. It was his job to stay alert for any danger like rogue asteroids, rogue comets, and, no matter how unlikely, Imperial patrols. It was his job and it was mind-numbingly boring.

He was a commando for Force's sake! Before he'd joined the Rebel Alliance he'd been an Imperial stormtrooper, a highly decorated one. He had been the poster-boy for the Imperial military until the Empire had decided to kill his father simply because he sympathized with the Rebels. That had opened his eyes to all the other Imperial abuses and driven him to shed his awards and rank and join the Rebels. He became their commando, he'd stolen the plans to the first Death Star and crushed the DarkTrooper project. He'd handled all sorts of insane missions that many had thought impossible, but he'd done it all. And now they had him surveying systems in the middle of nowhere.

Kyle scowled out the viewscreen of the _Crow_ and wished for the millionth time that he was doing something, really doing something. This type of mission was better suited to scientists and bookworms, not soldiers. Maybe the High Command thought he needed a break from the action, some time to cool down. Kyle didn't think so. He thrived on adrenalin, battle made him feel alive and in control. But he, like any good soldier, followed orders and his orders were to survey systems so here he was.

Actually, he really wasn't supposed to be _here_ specifically. This system was not on his list of what to look at. But when the time came to jump from 'system #6' to 'system #7', he'd felt the inexplicable need to stop halfway between them and check this place out. Since Jan had just ended her shift she hadn't been around to argue with him and talk him out of it. He trusted his instincts above all else, they'd saved his life countless times, and when they told him to do something he did it.

So here he was, waiting. He had no idea what he was waiting for. He knew it wasn't the probe droid results, but beyond that he had no clue. He felt that something would happen here, something important, but what that was, was not clear. It was frustrating, but Kyle forced himself to be patient. A good soldier does not rush into a situation without thinking about the consequences, it could get him killed. Kyle was a good soldier with good instincts. He would sit and wait.

A double chime and flashing light on the flight console suddenly broke the dull monotony of his watch. Kyle removed his feet from the dashboard and leaned over to study the alert. It was a minor proximity alarm. That meant that whatever it was, was close enough to be noticed, but not close enough to be an immediate threat. Kyle scratched at his stubbly beard and turned the _Crow_'s sensors towards the object to see what it was. His jaw dropped in shock when he finally realized what he was looking at.

It was an Imperial TIE fighter, heavily modified. And it was tumbling out of control across the orbit of the third planet. Without thinking about it, Kyle pulled the _Moldy Crow_ out of it's parking orbit of the second planet and moved in to take a closer look. As he drew nearer to the spinning fighter he became aware of how damaged it was. His sensors indicated a near total failure of all the fighter's systems and the twin ion engines had cut out, leaving the craft powerless. Again, without thinking about it, Kyle drew up behind the TIE and snagged it with the tractor beam.

Kyle waited until the beam had stopped the TIE's tumbling and stabilized its hold before guiding it towards the _Crow_'s tiny hanger bay. Originally, the _Moldy Crow_ had been a small Alderaanian freighter. But since he and Jan had come into possession of it, they'd refitted the cargo hold into a hanger large enough to squeeze two X-wings and a speeder into it. At the moment, it only held his X-wing and a swoop bike. There was just enough room to get this TIE inside. Kyle clenched his teeth in deep concentration as he blindly maneuvered the crippled Imperial craft into the bay and sealed it shut.

As soon as the hanger door light went from red to green, signaling that it had sealed, Kyle realized what he'd done. Inwardly cursing himself he scanned the system in search of other Imperial vessels. It was a known fact that TIE fighters lacked hyperdrives so there had to be a larger support ship nearby. But, oddly, after all his scanning he found no trace of other Imperials anywhere. Kyle frowned in confusion, this made no sense at all. With a sigh, he hauled himself out of the pilot's chair and ambled down towards the hanger. Maybe studying the salvaged fighter would give him some clue to this mystery.

"What the hell is going on?" Jan growled, popping out of her cabin as Kyle strode past it.

"What do you mean?" Kyle asked innocently.

"I heard the hanger doors moving. What the hell did you do?" Jan scowled, struggling to shrug off the clinging fingers of sleep.

"I picked up a broken TIE." Kyle shrugged as he reached for the door controls that would lead him into the hanger.

"Oh," Jan mumbled. Then her brain decoded what he'd just said. "_What!_ Kyle, are you _insane?_ That fighter's Imp buddies will be on us any second!"

"There are no other Imperials," Kyle replied, opening the door.

"What do you mean there are no other Imps?" Jan demanded, stepping in his path and halting his entry into the hanger.

"I mean there are no other Imps. I scanned the entire system and there was just this dead fighter spinning end over end towards the star," Kyle answered and managed to squeeze around her.

"How is that possible?" Jan mumbled disbelievingly.

"I don't know. I'm hoping that this wreck can explain it," Kyle muttered as he skirted his X-wing and approached the smoking TIE.

The first thing that Kyle noticed about the TIE was its solar panels. Normal TIEs possessed a pair of flat hexagonal panels that sandwiched the ball cockpit. This TIE had curved rectangular panels that almost totally encircled the cockpit which was more of an oval shape than a ball. The dual ion engines were the usual type, but shockingly, Kyle discovered that this fighter possessed its own compact hyperdrive, explaining why it was able to be here without a nearby support ship. An ugly back carbon score along the edge of the cockpit revealed a great deal of charred wires and showed why the fighter had been tumbling.

Kyle tapped his chin thoughtfully before springing up on top of the TIE. He walked around, studying the fighter from above. Jan watched him from the deck below, her expression unreadable. Kyle was about to jump down and take the TIE apart to study it when he found his eyes drawn to the cockpit hatch. A voice seemed to whisper to him without words. It called to him and before he realized it, he was kneeling by the hatch and prying it open. Feeling oddly detached from himself, Kyle peered into the smoke-filled, dark cockpit. What he saw made him curse in every language he knew.

"What is it? Are his brains blasted everywhere?" Jan asked lazily.

"No," Kyle muttered after his cursing was spent. He slowly leaned halfway into the craft, then lurched swiftly back out and cursed all over again.

"What is it?" Jan asked more insistently.

"Get to the bridge and set a course for the nearest medical facility you can find, now!" Kyle barked, pale and shaking.

"He's alive?" Jan mumbling disbelievingly.

"Yes," Kyle snapped tightly.

"What about the probes?" Jan asked.

"Forget them, they're ancient anyway. Now get going!" Kyle commanded.

"Fine, fine, I'm going." Jan grumbled and hurried away to do as he said.

"And set up the most secure, encrypted line to the High Command that you can for me!" Kyle shouted after her as he slipped back down to the deck.

He staggered to the nearest bulkhead and slumped down the deck of the hanger, trembling. Kyle Katarn, ex-Imperial stormtrooper, Rebel commando, was scared almost out of his mind. As he felt the _Moldy Crow_ shift beneath him as Jan followed his orders, Kyle struggled to pull himself back together. When he felt the transition into hyper-space, he climbed to his feet and strode to the bridge. He forced back his fears and buried himself in his soldierly discipline. The High Command needed to know what he knew.

_That was Darth Vader in there!_

* * *

Princess Leia Organa stalked out of the latest meeting of the Alliance High Council in a fury. The regular crew of the _Home One_ scattered from her path lest they incur her obvious wrath. She stormed through the massive ship, eventually making her way to an emptier section where she could be alone. The Princess finally stopped in front of a large window and stared out into the black depths of space. Here, she allowed her fury to mix with suppressed grief.

It had almost been five months since Cloud City. Five months since their capture and torture. Five months since Han had been frozen in carbonite and handed over to the bounty hunter, Boba Fett. Five months since Luke had his hand hacked off by the monster responsible for it all.

Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, torturer, murderer, criminal, and lap dog of the corrupt Emperor. That monster had tortured her twice now. Once in Cloud City, Bespin, and years earlier on the Death Star. He'd pumped her with drugs and tried his damnedest to violate her mind. Then he'd held her still and forced her to watch her world, Alderaan, and all the people on it die. He'd chased her and her Rebel forces from one side of the galaxy to the other and back again. And he'd damaged or destroyed all that she held dear. She hated him with a passion for it all.

Han was still out there, somewhere. She would find him. She and Chewbacca and Luke and Lando would find him and set him free of the carbonite that imprisoned him. Lando had finally tracked down Jabba, the vile Hutt that had put out the bounty on Han, and they were ready to go to Tatooine and free him. But then this meeting had come up and she had been forced to stay and deal with it. She was a member of the High Council and she had responsibilities and obligations. Leia could only hope that Luke, Lando, and Chewie would wait for her to finish up with this.

And 'this' was why she was so furious. It wasn't the fact that the meeting delayed her leaving the fleet to join up with her rescue mission. It was the subject of the meeting. Just thinking of it made her blood boil and her hands curl into trembling fists. She had always been a firm ally of Mon Mothma's. But this was too much to ask. Far too much.

Mon Mothma was the chosen leader of the Rebel Alliance. A former Senator of the Old Republic and ardent supporter of democracy, she could not stand by when the Empire rose, and so she helped form and organize the resistance that would become the Alliance. Despite her wish for democracy, she knew that democracy would only hobble the Rebels in their fight and so, quite reluctantly, she accepted a set-up in command very similar to the Empire that they fought. While she tried her best to allow all opinions to be heard, and she let the other Council members have as much say in the decisions as possible, when it all came down to it, her word was law. When she made a decision, that's pretty much what was done. The Princess had never regretted this way of operation…until now.

Not two days ago, Kyle Katarn had returned to the fleet in the middle of a survey mission bearing an extremely high profile prisoner. Somehow, Darth Vader's fighter had been damaged and separated from Imperial forces and the gravely injured Dark Lord had fallen into his custody. Instead of shooting him, like Leia would've done, Kyle had brought the foul Sith to the medical frigate for treatment. He'd managed to keep it secret until a smaller medical ship arrived and the monster had been moved there. Then the meeting had been called to decide their prisoner's fate.

_Correction_, Leia thought bitterly, _Mon decided his fate before the rest of us even knew about him and called the meeting to convince us to go along with her decision._

Mothma wanted to heal Darth Vader. She claimed to have some shred of pity on the monster and wished to see his injures taken care of. She believed that if they repaired his broken body, he could be persuaded to assist them against the Emperor. Her plan was to send him to a secret medical facility tucked away in an asteroid field where fugitive doctors continued their research in spite of Imperial restrictions. There he would remain until his body was restored and he was fit for further judgment.

Leia smiled humorlessly as she glared out the viewport. Vader was a monster that deserved no pity. He was quite fit for judgment right now. He should be killed as slowly and painfully as possible. He deserved to be tortured just like he had ruthlessly tortured any Rebel that he didn't kill outright. He was lower than a beast and should die like one. It was his turn to suffer now. It was his time to die.

A person came up behind her and waited. It was Mon Mothma. Leia knew it without turning around or hearing a word. Mothma was probably the only person who would come to see her right now. None of the other Council members would seek her out. All of them were on her side and against Mothma's decision. Leia's icy, bitter smile faded, her face a mask of stone.

"Don't even bother," the Princess growled, still staring off into space.

"Leia," Mothma whispered. "Come with me. There is something you must see."

Leia resisted for a few long minutes. But she gave in and turned to follow the Chandrilan woman. The Alderaanian Princess glared at the slender red-headed female as she followed her through the corridors of _Home One_, but Mothma was either oblivious of it, or more likely uncaring of it. Mothma brought her to a shuttle and gestured for the Princess to enter. Leia warily stepped aboard and took a seat as Mothma whispered their destination to the shuttle's pilot. Only when they left _Home One_ did Leia realize where they were going.

They were headed for the tiny medical ship where Vader was being held. Leia redoubled her glare at Mothma, but the slim woman gazed back unfazed. The journey was far too smooth and short for the Princess's tastes and her rage was being tempered by a growing sense of dread.

The shuttle jolted slightly as it hooked up with the medical vessel, _Angel's Shadow_. Mothma rose, whispered some instructions to the shuttle pilot, and gestured for Leia to rise and follow. With a sullen glare, Leia did as she was bidden and followed the Chandrilan aboard the _Shadow_. The medical ship was eerily silent. The only moving things she saw were droids, mostly medical droids, walking, rolling, or hovering about. There didn't appear to be a living sentient on board aside from the imprisoned patient.

Mon Mothma led her to a large medical bay in the center of the ship and keyed in a long code to unlock the door. Inside it was a bright, sterile white. A 2-1B droid crouched by the far side of a single bed that lay in the center of the chamber. All around it were several large machines that trailed wires and tubes that met in the center of the bed, like a spider's web. Mothma led the Princess up to this web and guided her gaze to the thing at the center of all this.

At first Leia didn't realize that it was human, or even alive. It just looked like an ugly pale lump of flesh, some fragment of a corpse somehow kept alive. There were no hands and only stubs of arms. There were no feet and only stumps of legs. Countless wires and tubes ran into the torso under the thin white sheet that preserved the patient's modesty. The face was half covered with a misty breathing mask and half covered with thick disfiguring scars. The skin was chalk white, marred with numerous scars, and practically hairless. The only sounds were the clicks and whirs of the machines and the faint regular hiss of the ventilator.

"Oh Gods," someone hissed. A few minutes later, Leia realized that it had been her who had spoken.

"Now you see why I find myself pitying him." Mothma sighed quietly. "And he is even worse off than he appears."

"What do you mean?" Leia swallowed, unable to tear her gaze away from the horrifying sight before her.

"The equipment that kept him alive and moving was sub-standard and hadn't been updated in decades. He was surviving on hardware from the Clone Wars era. It could've been up-graded, his quality of life vastly improved, but it was not. The Emperor could have easily helped him, but he did not. He may even have prevented Vader from improving his own health, trapping him permanently in that suit. Everyday of his life he has suffered, unable to breathe on his own, see with his own eyes, taste real food, feel the air and light on his skin, and smell anything beyond the recycled, filtered air of his mask," Mon informed her.

The Princess kept silent, staring at the monster that haunted her nightmares. A thick feeling of numbness spread throughout her body as she stared. Vader looked so weak and helpless outside of his suit and without his mechanical prosthetics. And yet when she'd met him before he was so terribly powerful. He could kill with just a gesture and did so, even to his own men if they displeased him.

For so long she'd wished to kill this man, this thing that had caused so much pain and destruction. And yet now…now, oddly enough, she did feel some pity for him, as Mon did. He didn't deserve what the Rebels were about to give him, not in the least, but…but he would receive it nonetheless. Leia sighed and finally looked away.

"You've made your point, you win," Leia mumbled. "But still, it feels like we're making a deal with the devil, and I don't like it."

"I know," Mon agreed. "But I feel that the benefits of this arrangement outweigh the risks. If we can rebuild him into a full Human again, something that the Emperor couldn't – or more likely, wouldn't – do for him, I'm sure that we could get at least some information from him, if not his physical aid in overthrowing Palpatine."

"But healing him will make him more dangerous," Leia argued quietly, staring down at the piteous, withered stump of a man. "He could very well turn on us and crawl back to Palpatine."

"I doubt that he'd return to Palpatine," Mon replied. "Now that he will no longer be dependant on the Emperor to preserve his health, I don't see his loyalty to that man lasting very long."

Leia forced her eyes away from the shriveled form of Darth Vader. "Do you know how long his medical treatment is scheduled to take?"

"The shortest estimate I was given was six months," Mon answered, "though it could take as long as a year."

"Fine, you have my support," Leia huffed. "But after this, I'm taking off on personal business." _I hope you really know what you're getting into here, Mon…_

Mothma said nothing in reply, she simply took the Princess's hand and led her back to the shuttle. As their shuttle left the _Angel's Shadow_ behind and returned to _Home One_ Leia thought about what was next. There would be at least one more meeting concerning Vader. She would have to stay and give Mon her support. But after that…after that she was free to go. She could go on to Tatooine and help save Han.

_Hold on Han, I'm coming for you…_


	3. Rebirth

**Chapter 3  
**_Rebirth_

For so long it was dark and still. Sometimes he came near waking, but he never quite made it. There was no real perception of time. All he knew was that it had been a long time since it had not been dark and still. He floated in the blackness, never truly awake, though sometimes nearly aware. There was soft solidness beneath him, something very light on top of him, and faint distant noise all around. This became his existence, his world. It never ever changed.

Then one day it did. Cold solid hands touched him. He was moved. The dark and still began to lift. Awareness drifted up from the deep unawareness. The dark became deep gray. There was motion. The soft solidness beneath him disappeared for a time, then returned, though the quality of it changed. More motion accompanied by loud sounds. Awareness was almost there, within reach. And then there was a spreading warm numbness, awareness faded, noise faded, and the darkness and stillness returned…

* * *

…Dark and still and wet. Fluid all around. Like the sea. But warm and calm. There was a humming—low, throbbing, and insistent. Tickles against his skin. Bubbles maybe, or maybe not. There was a flutter inside, heart beat. There was no other movement in the chest, no breathing. Awareness started to rise.

A sudden movement, moving up. A shock of cold air against wet skin. Gravity returned, ending the weightless floating. Cold metal on his back, rough straps on his chest. Suddenly upside-down and lungs hurting and heavy. Wakefulness almost there. Coughing, choking, fluid draining from his chest. Then air, glorious cold air, filled the lungs, breathing again. The dark was turning gray.

Right side up again. The straps were gone. Hands, metal and flesh, touched him. Breathe in, breathe out. Something went over his mouth and the air turned sweeter. His eyes flickered, the gray lightened. A splash and fluid was all around again, floating. Eyes almost opened, limbs twitched. Then the warm numbness came, smothering the not-quite-thoughts, and all was dark and still…

* * *

…Dark and still and wet. Again. Fluid, but not water, too thick, gel-like, gooey. The constant humming thrummed through him. He tingled. His heart beat, his lungs breathed. He floated in the still and dark and wet. Again awareness fought to break out and free. The humming stopped. Movement again, moving up again. Again the shock of cold air and return of gravity.

Hands, cold metal, warm flesh. Moving air against damp sticky skin. The tingling faded. Vigorous rubbing. A towel? Something was peeled off his face. A mask? The air he breathed now tasted stale. There was some pulling on his arms and some brief stinging. He was wrapped in something. A robe? A blanket? He was lowered on to a surface, soft but firm. A bed? Then all the half-frantic activity ceased and it was quiet.

The dark faded to gray. The still faded away. Awareness returned. His eyes flickered, tried to open, but the light was too bright, it stung. His mouth felt dry and tasted foul. His throat was thick and he struggled to swallow. He squirmed, or tried to, but his body was weak, sluggish. He tried to remember, but his mind was fuzzy, drifting, it almost felt blank. But he knew it wasn't. It would come back to him. It would. He sensed some beings approaching and he lay still to see what would happen.

"Is he awake?" A soft voice, female-sounding, asked.

"No, but he will be soon once the drugs metabolize out of his system." Another soft voice, also female-sounding, replied.

"How long will that take?" The first voice asked.

"A few hours at least." The second answered.

"And then he can be moved?" The first inquired.

"Yes, but it will be difficult. He will remain groggy for up to a full Standard day once he regains consciousness and he may behave abnormally during this time. His body must also adjust to have natural limbs again, so his movements will be weak and clumsy for several days at least, if not weeks." The second replied.

"I see." There was a pause. "Thank you for all you have done Doctor La."

"You are most welcome. I only regret that time does not permit me to observe his complete restoration and recovery. His case was a most exciting challenge." The second replied and he sensed this 'Doctor La' walked away.

The first speaker remained at his bedside. He struggled to get his fuzzy mind to focus properly on the Force so that he could better examine his visitor without having to bother with opening his eyes. For the moment he didn't worry about the odd conversation he'd overhead in favor of studying the female who stayed with him. He almost gasped aloud at what he found in her.

Her presence in the Force was almost blinding at first glance. But as he studied it, it became clear to him that she was wholly untrained. He doubted that she was even aware of her Force-sensitivity. She was clearly unaware of his Force-study of her. He then turned his Force sense to determining her identity. With such a bright Force signature he must know her. So who was she?

A gentle touch to his face ended pretty much all thinking on her identity. He was stunned. No one touched him unless they had to, he recalled that much. Why was she touching him? Her fingertips lightly traced his cheek, from his right temple down towards his chin. His mind reeled and he struggled to calm himself, but his mind refused to obey his commands. He needed to focus. He needed to open his eyes. His eyes decided not to cooperate, so he tried a different tactic.

_(Hello? Who's there?)_ He whispered, reaching out to her brightness in the Force.

There wasn't exactly an answer, just an explosion of shock, surprise, and a rush of fear.

_(Who are you?)_ He tried again, struggling to keep his communication clear and coherent.

_(I'm…I'm hearing things!)_ She thought rather loudly, unconsciously projecting out into the Force.

_(Of course you are. I'm talking to you,)_ he replied sluggishly.

_(Wha-what?)_ She was frightened and she pulled her hand away from him. The sudden loss of contact left him feeling oddly…bereft, incredibly alone. His chest tightened and he felt…panic?

"I'm hearing things…I'm hearing things…" She chanted aloud to herself, as if to convince herself that she was only losing her mind and not actually talking through the Force.

"Hearing things? What sorts of things?" A new voice, male, asked suddenly, making her jump and squeak.

"Han Solo! You're not supposed to be in here!" she hissed.

"Too bad. It's either this, or listen to Goldenrod ramble. I prefer here," Han Solo answered.

"This room is restricted," she protested.

"Then how come you're in here Princess?" Solo challenged teasingly.

"Because I'm on the High Council. I have the clearance to be here," she replied sharply.

"What about him? Does he have the clearance to be here?" Solo teased, obviously referring to the supposedly out-cold listener.

"Oh, he has clearance," the Princess snorted.

"Is he asleep?" Solo asked.

"Yes," the Princess almost whispered.

The Force rang with their emotions and he found it distracting. No, distracting wasn't the right word, more like disturbing and mildly painful. He could feel their attraction to each other, their passion, almost as if it were his own. And there was something deeper, more powerful than that beneath the lust. Love. He forced his eyes open so that he could glare at the two of them.

When his eyes focused what he saw stole his breath away. At first, the young woman he saw reminded him so much of Padmé, that he briefly thought that it was her. And the sight of 'Padmé' snuggling in the arms of another man sent a flare of jealousy and rage coursing through him. But a second later his muddled mind realized that it couldn't be Padmé. She was dead. He'd killed her. The brown-haired, brown-eyed woman was someone else.

Then it came to him. Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan. He'd encountered her several times before, but two instances in particular stuck out in his mind. Once was when he'd hunted her down and tried to regain the stolen Death Star plans and ascertain the location of the secret Rebel base. And the second time was when he'd captured her in Cloud City and tortured her as bait to draw his son to him. She'd managed to escape his clutches both times and thwart his plans as well. Her continued defiance always managed to infuriate him.

The man who was holding, and now starting to kiss her, was Han Solo. Solo was scum. A spice smuggler who'd drifted in with the Alliance, yet from all the information he'd been able to gather, the man hadn't officially joined the Rebel forces. He just hung around with them. He'd run into the pirate twice as well. The first time was again on the Death Star. While he didn't meet with him face to face, his disgraceful ship had caused him all manner of trouble. Solo again appeared with the Princess in Cloud City and suffered torture to again be the bait for his son. When the man's usefulness was through as bait, he became the test subject for the carbon-freezing chamber.

Vader (yes, that what he was called…wasn't it?) frowned. He recalled freezing Solo in carbonite. So why was the man standing right in front of him cuddling with the Princess? The scummy pirate should still be encased in the preservative block and hibernating. He should be frozen in a living sculpture of pain. What was he doing here? Something was very off.

"Get a room you two," Vader rasped, his voice weak and barely audible. They heard him loud and clear though.

"I thought you said he was asleep!" Solo yelped, spinning away from her.

"I thought he was!" the Princess snapped back.

"Well he obviously isn't!" Solo growled, obviously ruffled.

"I can see that!" the Princess hissed.

"Children!" Vader growled. "Enough!"

"_Children?_" Solo spat, looking furious.

"Yes, you are bickering like children, so you _are_ children," Vader rasped hoarsely, glaring at the pair of them.

"Why you!" Solo snarled and started to advance on him, but he stopped short and paled. "Kreth! His-his eyes changed color!" The pirate stammered.

Vader blinked, startled at the random subject change. Then he wondered how the Sith Hells Solo could see his eyes. Didn't his mask…? Suddenly Vader realized that his mask, his hideous black mask that kept him alive and breathing wasn't on and he knew he wasn't in the proper facility to survive without it. Mind reeling with confusion, Vader squeezed his eyes shut and reached for calm. He needed calm.

"Who in the Hells is he?" Solo demanded roughly. "Is he a changeling?"

Vader almost laughed at that. Where did Solo get _that_ silly idea? He kept his eyes closed and focused on getting himself back under control.

"No, he's human," the Princess replied, skipping over the question of identity.

"Well then who—?" Solo was interrupted by a sudden piercing alarm.

Vader's eyes snapped open, startled by the sudden noise. Lights were flashing in time with the pulsing of the alarm. He felt his danger sense flaring as the Force prickled around him.

"They're here," the Princess muttered.

"Sithspit," Solo cursed and stormed from the room.

"Who's here?" Vader demanded roughly.

The Princess ignored his question and moved to follow Solo. Vader swallowed hard and struggled to prop himself up on his elbows. It didn't work as well as he would've liked. His limbs felt oddly weak and uncoordinated. Frustrated, he glanced down to find that his mechanical prosthetics were gone and…his real arms and hands, his biological ones, were there. He gaped, numb with disbelief.

The wailing alarm sounded strangely distant all of a sudden. His ears began to buzz. After a time he became aware of the Wookiee, Chewbacca. The great hairy sentient scooped him up like he was a small child and carried him away. It was suddenly hard to breathe, his vision began to gray. Nothing made sense. His head hurt. Then there was nothing. Nothing at all…

* * *

Leia mentally recited her entire vocabulary of curse words as she fled the secret asteroid station with Han, Chewie, and…_him_. Alarms shrilled through the rough-hewn halls as they made a mad dash for the docking bay and the _Millennium Falcon_. On their way to the illegal medical facility tucked away at the edge of the Cron Drift they had run into some mercenaries who it appeared had managed to follow them here in spite of Han's best efforts. Now they had to get away from here with their prize before they caught and handed over to the nearest Imperial authority.

While she was grateful for the scientists and research doctors' paranoia and their high-grade, long-range sensors, Leia couldn't help but wish that they'd picked a less annoying alarm klaxon. The sound blasting out of every speaker was shrill and piercing and poor Chewie was grunting in pain as he loped through the halls with their prize held carefully in his hairy arms. With a final burst of speed, they exploded into the docking bay and raced to the lower ramp of the bucket of bolts that Han Solo called his ship. If they didn't lift off soon, the illegal stations' defensive shield would trap them, and the automated guns could mistake them for an attacker and blast them out of space.

She and Han scrambled to the cockpit while Chewie paused to dump his load off in one of the spare crew cabins. Thankfully it seemed that the patient they'd been deployed to retrieve had passed out in all the excitement. Leia almost laughed at that, but she knew it was probably the sedatives still in his system that had him unconscious again. Either way, his being asleep was a very good thing.

Slipping into the navigator's chair, Leia strapped herself in and waited for the _Falcon_ to lurch upwards. She watched Han run through the start-up procedures at lightning speed and prayed that the ship wouldn't decide to fail them. Moments later, Chewie flopped into the co-pilot's chair and Han got the saucer-shaped freighter rising out of the docking bay.

"C'mon, c'mon!" Han growled as he urged the _Falcon_ to climb faster.

Leia clutched the armrests of her chair as Han and Chewie guided the _Falcon_ into a series of gut-wrenching maneuvers as they sought to evade the quintet of mercenary ships that hunted them. If they could get above the plane of the rubble field, they could make a quick jump through hyperspace to buy themselves enough time to plan their next move. But their hunters didn't want to let them do that.

The sleek mercenary ships dogged them relentlessly, and there were enough of them to try and herd the _Falcon_ through the asteroids. Every time Han tried to make a break for it, an enemy ship blocked their path. It was starting to look hopeless, but then they caught a break when one of the five ships made a fatal error and slammed into one of the larger asteroids. In the confusion of the destruction, they were able to slip through a gap and reach clear space.

"Hit it, Chewie!" Han barked.

The Wookiee obediently threw the hyperspace controls and the hyperdrive responded. The star field stretched out into lines and then into the jagged mess of hyperspace. Only when the transition was complete did the palpable tension in the cockpit release.

"Well that was close," Leia sighed, slumping back into her seat in weak relief.

"Yeah," Han grunted. "So, who is that freak?" he asked, jerking his thumb back in the vague direction of where their prize lay.

"It's classified," Leia muttered evasively.

"Classified?" Han frowned. "I don't like this. This guy had better be worth it."

"I think he will be," Leia replied with a shrug. _Especially if Luke can sway him like he thinks he can…_

Han snorted. "You _think_?"

Leia shot him an annoyed look. "I'm going to go check on him," she announced and left the cockpit before Han or Chewie could answer.

She strode purposefully through the main cabin, barely sparing the anxious Threepio a glance as she passed the golden protocol droid sitting at the dejarik table. Her pace slowed as she reached the crew cabin section of the _Falcon_. And then she came to a screeching halt in front of the door to _his_ room.

It was stupid, but she couldn't make her hand raise to the entry pad to key open the door. He was unconscious, drugged, and weak from multiple, massive surgeries and medical procedures. And Luke seemed to think that there was something redeemable deep inside his withered husk of a heart. However, none of that changed the fact that it was Darth Vader on the other side of that door.

_This is stupid!_ she chided herself. _Grow up! He's in no position to do anything to me, even if he was awake. Now just open the door and go inside._

Shaking her head furiously, she opened the door and stepped inside before her nerve failed her. He was sprawled haphazardly on the bunk, partly due to Chewie's haste in getting rid of him and partly due to the crazy maneuvers that Han had had to engage in to secure their escape. But he was still completely unconscious and she sighed in relief.

After taking a few minutes to gather her nerve, she moved forward to properly settle her…guest on his bunk. He was heavy and moving him was awkward and every now and then she'd freeze to see if he was waking up. He didn't, and she managed to get him more comfortably arranged.

Standing back to survey her handiwork she was again struck by just how young he looked. When Doctor La had led her towards his hospital room, all his procedures had been explained. In addition to having his limbs cloned and replaced, and his lungs and other damaged organs restored, he also had most of his skin cloned and grafted to erase the disfiguring scars that had laced his body. The replacing of his skin had the side-effect of making him look younger than he was, as the doctors had seen no benefit in forcing his new parts to age to his chronological age. Doctor La said that doing such a thing risked ruining the cloned materials as forcing them to mature any faster could lead to mutations or cancer.

It really wasn't fair that Vader should get such good treatment. He shouldn't get the chance to look like a man in his mid-twenties when he was really in his early forties; he didn't deserve it. But the doctors hadn't consulted her. They had followed Mon Mothma's very general directive to restore him to full health and make him independent of any sort of artificial life support.

Settling down onto the empty bunk across from his, she watched his sleeping form for a while. She didn't know why she didn't just leave and return to Han. It was probably morbid curiosity she decided.

A few months back, just days after helping her, Chewie, Lando, and the droids rescue Han from Jabba the Hutt on Tatooine, Luke had dumped several bombshells on her. One, he was her long-lost twin brother. Two, she shared the same mysterious Jedi power that he did. And three, Darth Vader was his father…which meant that he was her father too.

Accepting that Luke was her brother was incredibly easy. It was as if a part of her had always known the truth, and so when he'd told her she really didn't feel much surprise or shock. The knowledge just felt right on a visceral level and she did not question it.

But the other two revelations were much harder to stomach. That she was potentially capable of all the same things that Luke was was startling to her. She really didn't believe it. It was ludicrous. Luke seemed so damned certain, though…

And then there was Vader as her father. That idea was so repellant to her that it almost made her physically ill. There was just no way that she could be related – in any way! – to that murderous monster, that genocidal bastard. It just couldn't be!

Yet Luke was so sure that Darth Vader was once Anakin Skywalker, his biological father. And since Luke was her brother – her _twin_ brother, not her half-brother – Vader _had_ to be her father too. She was the child of the monster she had feared and hated most.

She now had some proof that Luke was right, too. Looking at Vader, she could see hints of Luke's features in his face. And when he'd been briefly conscious, she'd seen the color of his eyes: blue, like Luke's. She didn't understand the flash of inhuman amber that she and Han had seen in his eyes, but it didn't seem to be permanent…

_Luke might know what that's about,_ Leia decided, trying to push the disturbing image of the demonic eyes from her mind. _He's the expert. When we meet up with him again, I'll ask him about it._

Vader stirred a little in his sleep and she tensed, ready for the confrontation to continue. However, after a moment he relaxed and fell still again. Leia breathed deeply in relief.

_I wish he could stay asleep for the whole trip back to the fleet…but that could be at least a week away. _She looked away from his sleeping form and focused on the dingy floor instead. _When he wakes up, he's Threepio's problem_, she decided, unwilling to deal directly with him for the time being.

Threepio was the most fit among them to take care of Darth Vader. His personality probably wasn't ideal, but the fact that he was a droid and not a living thing was what mattered. Vader could used the mystical Force to break Threepio, but not 'kill' him, and he couldn't influence the droid's mind the way he could manipulate Han's or Chewie's or even her mind.

She might be able to resist Vader's attempts to manipulate her mind, but she had doubts that she could resist him forever. When she'd stolen the Death Star plans, she'd been able to stand up to him, but only just. If he'd had more time to work on her, wear her down, she was certain that he would've gotten the knowledge he wanted. Or perhaps he would've gotten frustrated and damaged her in his fury, maybe even killed her. She would never risk him getting into her head again, especially not now.

Now she had more damning secrets in her head besides the location of the Rebel base or where she'd sent the Death Star plans. Her mind now held the secret of her heritage; that Luke was her brother and Vader her true father. Vader didn't know this, and if she had her way he would _never_ know. If he did find out, it wouldn't be from her.

But it seemed that, even when drugged, Vader had no problem getting into her head. She recalled his groggy whispers in her head and shuddered. He hadn't sounded at all threatening, but even the drugged touches of his mind against hers dredged up the painful memories of her interrogation.

_He's never getting in my head again,_ Leia vowed, leaving the room and setting the door to 'lock' behind her. _I will stay away from him as much as I can, and if he tries anything funny, I'll hit him with a stun blast. That should work until we get back to the fleet and Luke. Then Luke can take care of him._

Her mind firmly made up, she went to go sit with Threepio and inform him of his new duties to their very temporary guest…


	4. Visitation

**Chapter 4  
**_Visitation_

_The Jedi Temple on Coruscant was eerily silent and empty. Normally it was bustling with activity. Knights and Masters would mill about and exchange words between missions. Initiates would scamper about from class to class, eyeing the Masters and older Knights wondering who would take them on as a Padawan. Padawans would trail after their Masters, seeking to become no more than shadows so as not to get in the way and learn as much as possible. _

_Even on its darkest day the Temple had not been empty. He remembered leading the clones inside the front gates. Remembered igniting his Jedi saber and cutting down Masters, Knights, Padawans, and Initiates. He recalled entering the Council chamber and slaughtering the younglings who cowered there in fear. And when it was all over, the Temple was still full. But this time it was full of corpses, both Jedi and clone. _

_But now Anakin found it completely empty. He walked the halls, wincing at each of his footsteps as they echoed loudly throughout the Temple. A glance at a mirror hanging on one of the walls revealed that he was as he was during the end of the Clone Wars. Anakin smiled faintly, pleased that his proper appearance had been restored. No more icky black mask and nasty life support suit for him! It was back to his handsome face and proper Jedi robes. _

_Anakin continued on his way through the deserted Temple. He found himself stepping into the lift that would take him to the Council chamber. He flicked the proper key and leaned his back against the lift car wall as he waited. A lifetime ago he'd traveled in this lift to be tested by the Council to see if he could become a Jedi. Later he'd traveled here to receive his assignments as a Padawan. He'd been knighted here, and not too long after, been given a seat of the Council, though the Masters refused to grant him equal rank with them. _

_That last thought made him frown. Palpatine had given him a great honor by forcing the Council to accept him, yet they still resisted, insisted on holding him down. He was just as powerful as any of the Council Members, he deserved the rank of Master, and they had denied him that. _

_The lift doors opened and Anakin strode to the Council chamber doors. With barely a gesture he used the Force to open the doors and then close them behind him. The room was just as he remembered it. A light airy chamber with large windows and smooth rounded lines. The view of the Coruscant skyline he glimpsed through the windows was just as eerie as his walk through the Temple. The city-planet's sky was totally empty of traffic, and that never ever happened. Anakin paused just short of the center of the chamber and stared out the windows as he tried to make sense of it. _

_"Where is all the traffic?" Anakin mumbled to himself. _

_"There is no traffic, Anakin," a soft, hauntingly familiar voice replied. _

_Anakin whirled around to see his Master. No, his former Master. Obi-Wan Kenobi. The one Jedi he despised above all others. The Jedi who had done the most to ruin his life. His betrayer. The last Jedi in the entire galaxy. The last Jedi he'd killed. _

_But Kenobi was like Anakin. He appeared to be the same age as he had been at the Republic's fall. And yet…his eyes. They looked just as old and tired as he thought they looked when he struck the old man down at last on the first Death Star. _

_Anakin drew himself up and glared at his former Master. "I'm in no mood for your riddles, Jedi," he spat. _

_"There is no traffic because this is a dream of sorts. You are not on Coruscant, you are asleep," Kenobi clarified. _

_"Hmph, that makes sense," Anakin muttered, transferring his glare to the ornate floor. _

_"Anakin, what is the last thing that you remember?" Kenobi asked after a pause. _

_Anakin scowled at the floor and tried to recall his last waking moments. It was strangely difficult. Everything was fuzzy, muddled, and disjointed. What did come to him made no sense whatsoever. No matter how hard he concentrated his memories failed him. He clenched his teeth and fists in growing frustration. _

_"I don't know," Anakin hissed through his clenched teeth. _

_"Try starting from your last flight in your TIE fighter," Kenobi suggested. _

_"I…I was upset. I needed to fly. So I went out and flew for a while. Then some idiot Rebels dropped out of hyper-space right on top of me. One got a shot off and shorted out my controls. My hyperdrive malfunctioned. My restraints snapped. I hit my head…" Anakin trailed off and looked up from the floor to stare at Kenobi. "Did…I die?" _

_Master Kenobi blinked, then burst out laughing. "No! No you didn't die! You are very much alive, Anakin. The dead do not dream." _

_"I don't see what's so funny," Anakin grumbled. _

_"I'm sorry," Kenobi chuckled, wrestling his humor under control. "But if you did die, you would know it." _

_"Whatever," Anakin growled. "Why are you asking what I remember?" _

_"I'm curious to see how complete your memories are of recent events," Kenobi replied. _

_"Why are you curious?" Anakin demanded suspiciously. _

_"Because your life is about to get very…interesting from this point on," Kenobi answered with a mysterious glint in his tired, sad eyes. "I only wish to help you as much as a ghost can." _

_"You? Help me?" Anakin scoffed, feeling the old bitter rage rise in him. "That's a laugh," He spat and stormed away towards the lift. _

_"Anakin!" Kenobi called after him. _

_Anakin didn't slow or look back. He almost threw himself into the lift car and angrily stabbed the key for a lower floor. As the car descended he seethed at the Jedi Master. But his seething was cut short. The light in the car flickered and went out. The car stopped moving and all was quiet. Then Anakin felt himself drift away. The dream was over…_

* * *

Vader groaned, rolled over, off the bed, and hit the floor. He moaned and lay still for a minute as he became aware that his shoulder and hip were hurting him. The cold metal floor aided the aching of his body in pushing him towards wakefulness. With another groan, he rolled onto his back and slowly opened his eyes. 

_Where am I?_ he wondered once the ship lights stopped blinding him. For a short eternity he couldn't remember anything. Then the dream came back to him and he frowned a little. What happened after his TIE accident? The hazy images and perceptions that followed his fateful flight were no clearer now than they had been when Kenobi had questioned him. But…

_The Rebels have me,_ Vader realized. He now clearly remembered his odd encounter with the Princess and Solo in some sort of hospital. There had been an alarm and the Wookiee had carried him like a sack of Garqi Taters to…somewhere. Here probably, wherever 'here' was. Vader decided to find out and staggered clumsily to his feet. And then he promptly fell over when his knees gave out.

Mentally cursing his weakness and clumsiness, Vader struggled to sit up and propped himself up against the side of the bunk he'd been sleeping on. Then he felt his mind shorting out as he got a good look at his feet. His real feet, flesh and blood and bone feet. He found it oddly hard to breathe. His fingers trembled as he touched them and found that they were real, really there. He gasped for air and then was struck by something else.

His hands were real too. All his mechanical prosthetics had been replaced by the limbs his prosthetics had been meant to replace. Vader flexed one hand, then the other, while his mind grappled with this sudden shocking development. His head throbbed and felt light, disconnected. Panic and shocked disbelief squeezed his lungs and made him gasp for oxygen. His heart raced in his chest. He was close to passing out. He buried his face in his hands as he groped for control and was hit with yet another shock.

He wasn't wearing any sort of oxygen mask at all. He was breathing all on his own. And his face felt smoother. His scars, the results of his burns and various other injuries, were gone. And his hair, his hair was back. It was little more than prickly stubble on his restored scalp, but soon it would be back to the way it had been. The thick ropy scars that had covered the top and back of his skull were gone. In fact, it seemed that all his burn scars were no longer there. It appeared that he had been totally restored.

_… "And then he can be moved?" _

_"Yes, but it will be difficult. He will remain groggy for up to a full Standard day once he regains consciousness and he may behave abnormally during this time. His body must also adjust to have natural limbs again, so his movements will be weak and clumsy for several days at least, if not weeks." _

The scrap of conversation drifted back to Vader as he forced his breathing to slow down. It had been between the Princess and some mysterious doctor. They had been talking about him, discussing his condition. He hadn't thought much of it, he hadn't really pain attention to the details of what they said. Now it hit him full force.

_They healed me. The…the Rebels healed me. **They healed me?**_

"Sir?" an electronic voice piped up in inquiry. Vader dazedly looked up and focused his eyes on a golden protocol droid holding a small tray. "Sir, are you alright?"

"I…I'll be fine," Vader mumbled, his voice sounding terrible.

"Oh, I am most glad to hear that." The droid replied cheerfully. "I am C-3P0, human cyborg relations, and I am fluent in over six million forms of communication. Princess Leia has requested that I bring you some lunch." The droid, Threepio, bent down to him and held out the tray which held a few ration bars and a squat glass of water.

"Thanks," Vader mumbled and numbly and took the tray from the droid.

Threepio bowed to him, then shuffled out of the cabin, closing the door behind him. Vader stared at the sealed door for five minutes before snapping to the present. Mindlessly, he unwrapped the ration bars and ate the dry, tasteless nutrition squares and mechanically chewed them. Every few bites he'd take a sip of water to wash the tastelessness out of his mouth. When he finished eating what had been provided for him, he set the tray aside and awkwardly climbed back into the bunk he'd fallen out of. Then something hit him.

_Threepio?_

* * *

Not too long after lunch, Vader had to get up. He needed to pay a visit to the 'fresher. Not only did he have to relieve himself, but he felt scummy. He needed to shower and probably shave too. So, with a weary groan, he climbed off the bunk he had been laying on and started for the door. He made it about two steps before pitching forward to crash into the deck. 

Had any living sentient been present, the foul curses that slipped from Vader's lips would've probably seared their aural organs to a crisp. Thankfully he at least kept the volume of his cussing down to a harsh whisper so that the other residents of the ship didn't have to hear it. Only when the sharp pains in his knees and palms faded to dull throbs did his explicit language come to a stop.

Slowly, stiffly, he managed to sit up. He cursed his new limbs for their weakness and clumsiness. While he was very glad that he once again was whole, he wished that his restored self would actually work the way he wanted it to. After rubbing at his sore spots, he stiffly staggered to his feet and tried to make it to the door again.

This time as he started to fall, he managed to angle himself so that he smacked into a wall instead of the floor. It hurt, but at least he didn't fall to the deck again. Using the wall, he slunk around the edge of the small cabin to the door. When he reached the door key pad, he reached out with a clumsy, trembling hand to key it open. The first time his finger missed the necessary key, but the second time he made it. The door didn't open. It had been locked.

Vader glared at the door for a minute before letting his breath out in a loud sigh. He closed his eyes and focused on the Force. Once he had gathered the proper focus, he let his eyes open as he gestured at the door. He tripped the lock circuit and tricked the door into thinking that it was okay to open without the proper code being entered from the other side. A second gesture got the door to slide open and let him out into the corridor beyond the cabin.

He stretched out his Force senses before he stepped out into the rest of the ship to see where the crew was. He detected two living sentients in the bridge area, probably Captain Solo and his Wookiee. Elsewhere, the main cabin he thought, he spied the brilliant blaze of the Princess. She seemed to be napping. And also in the vicinity of the Princess he picked up the tiniest flicker of a droid, Threepio. There was no one to stop him or hold him up from his simple mission.

Using the Force as his guide, he staggered slowly through the ship, the _Millennium Falcon_, towards the 'fresher. It took him far longer than he would've liked, but he got there. The refresher was tiny, cramped, and run-down-looking, but it worked and that's what really counted.

After he took care of his most pressing business, he stripped and slipped into the sonic shower. Once he felt properly clean he stepped out and got dressed in what he'd been wearing before, a simple pair of white shorts and a white robe with sleeves just an inch too short for him. Then he located Solo's razor and looked into the mirror to shave. What he saw stunned him.

Vader was in his early forties. The face that stared back at him in the mirror barely looked to be more than thirty, if that. And his eyes were blue. Not the lurid yellow of the Emperor's eyes, not the color he'd long thought they'd turned after he'd been put in the suit. They were blue. Like Luke's eyes.

He didn't know how long he stood there and stared at his reflection, but he eventually snapped out of it and got on with the business of shaving. He braced himself with his left hand on the washbasin and used his right to move the dry shaver over his stubbly face. Vader was never one for beards. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan may have liked them, but he wasn't ready to look quite so old.

Once he finished shaving, he put the razor back where he'd found it and staggered out of the 'fresher and back towards his cabin. The hard, cold metal floor irritated his feet and he wished for some slippers. When he reached his cabin a wave of weariness swamped him and he almost slumped to the floor right there. But he pulled himself together long enough to trick the door again with the Force and drag himself back to the bunk. There he collapsed onto his back and sighed. He closed his eyes, just for a moment, and drifted off to sleep…

* * *

Leia flicked the switch and made her final move in the dejarik game she was playing with Threepio. She knew it was her final move because this was her second to last piece and any move that Threepio made next would seal her fate. The little holographic critter that represented her playing piece scuttled from one square to another, making little chirping noises as it moved. Threepio studied the circular board for a fraction of a second before making his own move. And just as she predicted, one of his many remaining pieces took out the one she'd just moved and her last piece was completely surrounded. Game over. 

"Would you like to play again Princess Leia?" Threepio asked politely.

"No thank you Threepio," Leia sighed. Twenty games she'd played against the golden droid and every single one she'd lost. She was quite sick of losing.

"Is there anything else I might do for you Princess?" Threepio inquired.

"No, you can shut down for a maintenance cycle if you like," Leia replied.

"Alright then," Threepio chirped then stiffened up as his eyes went dim.

Leia sighed and slumped back in her seat next to the game board. They were in hyperspace now and they'd stay there for a whole other day before returning to normal space. Then from there it was nearly another full day until they reached the rendezvous point with the main body of the Alliance fleet. And until then she had nothing to do. No paperwork to mess with. No repairs that needed doing, which was surprising. All she had were her thoughts and that was the last thing she wanted.

She considered going to the bridge and visiting with Han and Chewie. But if she did, she'd have to deal with Han. Chewie was never a problem though she found it difficult to understand his native language a good half of the time. Han, on the other hand, was the real problem. Sure she loved the man, but he was also aggravating beyond belief. Every conversation she had with him either ended in an argument, sometimes passionate kissing, and at times even both. No, she didn't feel up to dealing with him at the moment.

Without realizing it, she found herself on her feet and striding towards the locked cabin that contained their 'passenger'. She stopped at his door and punched in the lock code on a sort of autopilot. The door hissed open and she slipped inside like a silent shadow. After the door sealed behind her she allowed herself to look upon the form of their 'passenger'.

Again she was struck at just how ordinary he looked. He had a handsome young face that looked so shocking innocent considering who it belonged to. He was on the tall side for a human, but not overly so. His hair was little more than stubble, fine and dark blonde. And in sleep, as he was now, he looked so peaceful.

He had come a long, long way since she'd seen him just over half a standard year ago. Back then he'd been a maimed, scarred, scrap of a man. Legless and armless, he'd been confined to the hideous suit that the galaxy knew and feared him for. Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, terror of the stars, horror of countless worlds. Inside his cage of darkness he was little more than a bitter, wrathful, broken man living on borrowed time. If one could call his existence living.

That long half year ago Mon Mothma had brought her to see him as he lay helpless, injured, and in a drugged stupor. In spite of all the pain and suffering he'd brought to the galaxy, all the pain he'd brought to her and those she loved, she felt pity for him. She'd had the strangest impulse to grant him mercy, just as Mon had when she'd surveyed him. And so she supported her leader in the drive to ship him off to the asteroid medical center and put him in the care of an exiled team of doctors headed by the Kaminoan doctor, Rana La. They sent him there to heal him further than the Emperor had allowed.

Back then, she had been ignorant of so many things. After Han's rescue on Tatooine, right in the middle of the mission against the Death Star II on Endor, Luke had enlightened her. He revealed some of the secrets that her adoptive father, Bail Organa, never had the time to tell her. Luke told her that they were twins, long separated and hidden. She'd always felt a strange, deep connection with him, and now it all made perfect sense. And there was more.

That same night in the arboreal Ewok village he'd let her know another terrible secret. Six months before, during the debacle on Cloud City when Vader had hacked off his hand, the Dark Lord had imparted a horrifying piece of information to him. Darth Vader was his father. That was why he'd been so disturbed and despondent after Bespin. He hadn't wanted to believe it, but his mysterious Jedi powers, and later the equally mysterious Jedi Master Yoda, had proven it to be true.

And since Luke was her brother, her twin, that meant that Darth Vader was her real father too. The man who had enforced the most terrible, evil orders of the decrepit Emperor. The man who had tortured her with drugs and mind probes. The man who had held her still as the world she grew up on, the world she knew as home, was destroyed before her very eyes. The man who had tormented, frozen, and sold Han, the scoundrel she'd fallen for. The man who had cut off her brother's hand and sought to corrupt him. That same man was the one who had given her life.

She didn't want to believe it. She desperately didn't want it to be true. But just as she felt kinship with Luke, she felt an echo of that for this man who slept on the bunk before her. The knowledge made her felt sick and ashamed. Her eyes stung with unshed tears of bitter pain. While he had not raised her, had any hand in her upbringing, his tainted blood still flowed through her veins. And that taint could very well drag her down into the depths of Hell with him. She could become Dark like him.

So far the secret of her heritage remained between her and her brother. Han knew that she and Luke were siblings, but that was as much as he knew. She'd only told him that because he had the mistaken idea that she loved Luke in a non-sibling way and had been ready to stand aside and leave them to each other. No one else knew a thing. Luke even told her that he was certain that Vader did not know of his relation to her. He only knew of Luke, his son, because of the Skywalker name and his power in the Force. Leia was safe from him knowing of her true relationship to him. But it brought her no comfort.

No one could know this information. No one could ever know. They would feel betrayed by her and Luke. They would turn away, maybe even turn against them. The Rebel Alliance would never stand for one of its leaders, one of its greatest heroes, to be the spawn of the enemy, of the Sith. At the very least they would 'kindly' request that she and Luke leave, at worst they would be killed.

Leia slumped down to the deck, weary and dejected. She felt hope slip through her soul's grasp. The tears began to fall at last as she finally admitted to herself what she had been trying to deny ever since Luke had told her the secret.

_I'm doomed… _

* * *

Han Solo stared out at the jagged blue-white view of hyperspace and sighed. This was the mind-numbingly boring part of flying and he could just as well have done without it. But without the ability to exceed the speed of light this way, there would be a hell of a lot more mind-numbingly boring flying the endless starry void of normal space. Sub-light speed travel was good for moving in atmosphere and in-system, but when going between stars, hyperspace was the only way to do it. 

Chewie seemed to be napping in the modified co-pilot's seat next to him. Even after being modified, the seat seemed still too small for Chewie's lanky frame, but the Wookiee didn't complain. The hairy alien's eyes were closed and his powerful long arms were folded over his chest so he looked asleep. But he could very well be sitting like that and thinking instead of sleeping. Han didn't feel like finding out, though if his case of boredom got any worse, he just might…

_Where's Leia?_ Han wondered, glancing around the tiny bridge. She wasn't anywhere in sight, which was a little odd. Usually by lunchtime she'd get bored enough with Threepio's company to come and sit with him.

Feeling like giving her a hard time, Han got up and left the autopilot to take care of the flying unsupervised for a while. He checked every cabin and compartment as he leisurely strolled through his ship. Aside from spotting Threepio in the main cabin, he didn't see anyone around. Then he found her just outside the spare cabin where they'd put the mysterious patient.

"So your Worship, are you going to tell me who that guy is yet?" Han grumbled, rather annoyed that he still had no idea who he was sharing his prized ship with.

Leia jumped and then whirled on him with a furious glare. "Don't sneak up on me like that!" she hissed.

"I wasn't trying to," Han chuckled.

"Whatever," Leia muttered, clearly in a bad mood.

"So who is he?" Han asked, getting back on the subject.

"It's classified," Leia replied. The same answer she'd given every time he'd asked.

"Can you give me a hint here?" Han scowled slightly.

Leia shook her head. "I don't know," she sighed and slipped around him to go to the main cabin.

"Well what can you tell me about him?" Han grumbled, chasing after her.

"Not much," Leia replied with a shrug, "it's best not to ask questions about him."

That, of course, made Han want to find out all that could about this mystery man all the more. "Why?"

"Just think of him as cargo," Leia suggested stiffly. "As soon as we rendezvous with _Home One_ you won't have to worry about him any more."

"He's obviously a patient seeing as we picked him up from a medical ship," Han mused, ignoring her advice. "Is he a prisoner?"

"Yes," Leia answered after a minute, pausing in the entranceway to the main cabin.

"Is he dangerous?" Han frowned.

"No, not after all the surgery he's undergone," Leia replied. "I'd be surprised if he can walk two steps without falling over."

Han's frown deepened. "I don't like this," he grumbled.

"It's only for two more days and he'll probably sleep the entire time," Leia snorted. "There's nothing to worry about," she assured him, though she looked troubled about something.

"Sure," Han muttered disbelievingly, casting a suspicious glance back at the sealed cabin where their 'guest' was staying. "Whatever you say your Worshipfulness."


	5. Mysteries

**Chapter 5  
**_Mysteries_

Vader sighed and stared blankly up at the ceiling above his bunk. It had been at least two days since he first awakened, probably more, he couldn't tell. In all that time the only visitor he'd had was Threepio who delivered him his meals of dry, tasteless ration bars and a glass of water. The only time Vader ever rose from his bed was to visit the 'fresher.

At times he'd seriously considered simply getting up, walking to the bridge, and talking over the rust-bucket _Millennium Falcon_ so that he could return to the Empire. But he never came close to following through with that thought. He was still too weak and uncoordinated to overthrow Solo, his Wookiee, and the Princess. Even with the Force he doubted he could take and keep control of this ship long enough to escape back to his own side.

_And that would be betraying them._ A voice deep in the back of his mind whispered. _They helped you, healed you, where Palpatine did not._ It hissed softly. _Returning to the Empire would be a betrayal…_

Betrayal was one of the dark ways of the Sith Order. Betrayal was how the Apprentice succeeded the Master. Betrayal was how the Sith did things. Vader had used the tactic himself before. In Cloud City he had twisted his 'deal' with the Baron-Administrator, Calrissian, to get what he wanted. He'd betrayed the Jedi Order in his desperate attempt to save Padmé's life. He'd betrayed all that he once stood for to save her and gain the power that he needed to become free from his lingering fears…

Vader abruptly cut off that train of thought. He'd made the right decision in joining the Sith. He'd done the right thing. The Jedi needed to be destroyed before their corruption and stifling repression strangled the galaxy. It had been the right thing, his destiny. It had to be the right thing. It had to be. He couldn't be wrong. _He couldn't be wrong._

"Sir?" Threepio interrupted his thoughts, peering into the cabin.

"Yes?" Vader sighed, tilting his head slightly so that he could make a little eye contact with the golden droid.

"Princess Leia has asked me to inform you that we shall arrive at _Home One_ within one standard hour," Threepio announced.

"Thank you Threepio," Vader muttered and looked away.

"You are welcome sir," Threepio chirped and shuffled off.

When the door hissed shut, Vader slowly pushed himself up into a sitting position. _Home One_ was obviously the designation of a Rebel ship, but he was unfamiliar with the name. Perhaps it was a recent acquisition. Or maybe it was some ship that had so far managed to avoid being associated with the Rebellion.

Whatever _Home One_ was didn't matter though. What did matter was that in one standard hour, he would be in the clutches of the leadership of the Rebellion. They would gloat over him, surely. He was Darth Vader after all, Dark Lord of the Sith, and the most hated and feared man in the galaxy behind the Emperor himself. There would be a trial of course, they had to make themselves look legitimate, but it would be a formality, a farce. His fate was already long decided. They would kill him.

_But they healed you!_ That little voice whispered. _Why kill you after investing so much effort into making you whole again? It doesn't make any sense._

He frowned and shook his head. What didn't make sense was healing him at all. Logically they should've killed him on sight, when he was broken, unconscious, and helpless. So obviously they weren't thinking logically. Instead they had repaired his shattered and maimed body…all the better to make him suffer later.

There was someone outside the door, he sensed, and then it hissed open. He glanced over to find the Princess there, staring at him. She still hated him, he could tell, though her face was perfectly neutral. She was also surprised to see him awake and a little frightened. But she was a proud young woman, every bit the princess she was by blood, and she refused to let her face reveal anything of what she was feeling.

"As Threepio has already told you, we are approaching _Home One_. I just thought to check on you and see if you needed anything," She informed him coolly.

Vader stared at her for a long minute. _She's got to be joking._ "Some clothes would be nice," he finally replied.

"Unfortunately I don't think any of General Solo's things will fit you," the Princess responded tartly.

_General Solo? He must have finally joined up…_ "Yes, how unfortunate," he commented dryly. _I bet you planned it that way so that the Rebel leadership will just see me in my underwear and bathrobe…_

"I'm certain something can be found for you when we arrive," she replied calmly. "Anything else?"

_She can't be serious,_ he scoffed. "I don't suppose that you could let me go?"

"Where?" She cocked an eyebrow. "Out into the vacuum of space?"

A dangerous seed of annoyance took root inside of him. "Yes, it would be quicker," he growled.

"Quicker than what?" She frowned slightly.

"Whatever slow execution it is that awaits me," Vader replied coldly.

She briefly looked startled at his bluntness and then she smirked slightly. "I doubt that you'll be executed now, at least by us."

He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "What do you mean?"

"The Emperor has caught wind of your restored state and has declared you a traitor," the Princess told him with a sweet, sarcastic smile. "Apparently he thinks that you came to us and asked for help."

It was a slap in the face. True he and the Emperor no longer even feigned friendship with one another. He was the servant, the muscle that carried out Palpatine's will, and nothing more. But for his Master to do this to him, to punish him this way was shocking and painful. For over twenty years, half his life now, he had served the Emperor faithfully, and _this_ was how he was repaid for his services?

"Surprised?" She snorted. "You, of all people, know the Emperor best. I'd think you would expect something like this from him."

"Shut up!" he snapped, losing his composure.

The Princess flinched back from him, wide-eyed and fearful. Then she gathered herself up and fixed him with a glare. "Behave yourself and I might be able to arrange for you to seek vengeance on that withered old man if you want it."

Vader just stared at her, torn between rage, despair, and fear. His face only reflected the rage though. So that's all that she saw. At least that's what he thought.

"Here," she held out her hand, "come wait with me. I'm sure that you're sick of seeing the inside of this room."

He stared at her hand, stunned that she would offer it to him of all people. Then he ignored it and struggled to lever himself up from the bunk. He didn't need her help, he didn't need her pity, he didn't want it. With great effort, he stood and stared down at her coldly.

She met his stare without flinching. "This way," she said and then added, "oh, and by the way, General Solo isn't aware of who you are. I suggest that you don't tell him or he might shoot you before I can stop him."

Vader was surprised at this warning. But it made sense, he realized, as he shuffled slowly after the Princess. If Solo knew the man he had seen on the hospital station was Darth Vader, he never would've let him aboard the _Millennium Falcon_; he probably would've tried to kill him right then and there.

She brought him to the worn-out looking main cabin and a small table that doubled as a dejarik board. Threepio was already there, sitting and waiting patiently for the _Falcon_ to arrive and dock with the _Home One_. He sat beside the golden protocol droid, putting him solidly between himself and the Princess.

The Princess didn't appear to notice his purposeful avoidance of her. Or maybe she just didn't care. She probably preferred it that way after all that he'd done to her. And she seemed just as happy not to speak to him anymore, or even look directly at him. She simply settled back in her seat and waited as patiently as her droid companion.

He hated waiting. He'd always hated waiting. But he had no choice in the matter. His body was simply too weak for him to busy himself with anything. He didn't even have the strength to hover, not that Solo would take kindly to such an action. This wasn't his ship, this wasn't the _Executor_. Here he was just a passenger, a secret prisoner.

The ancient, rusty _Falcon_ shuddered as it dropped below light-speed and made a slow turn as it presumably headed for the Rebel rendezvous point and the _Home One_. Several minutes passed, and then several more, and still the Corellian tramp freighter failed to land. This stretch of time seemed to be much too long for the Princess, and after some fidgeting, she abandoned him and Threepio at the table and marched into the cockpit.

Vader tilted his head in the direction of the cockpit and drew slightly on the Force to bolster his hearing. He despised being left in the dark and he refused to sit and wait in ignorance while the Princess dealt with the problem. Since he couldn't get up and follow the Princess, eavesdropping was the next best thing.

"What's the problem?" he heard the Princess snap. "Don't tell me that the NavComp is broken and we're lost."

"We're not lost!" Solo argued back. "We're exactly where we're supposed to be. It's just that no one's here. Look! Do you see anyone?"

There was a pause that Vader took to be the Princess peering through the cockpit viewscreen. "Stang," she cursed quietly, barely audible to even his Force-enhanced hearing. "They must've been stopped and scattered."

The Wookiee howled something that Vader couldn't understand.

"Nah," Solo replied. "I doubt it was the Empire. It was probably more Black Sun agents."

_Black Sun?_ Vader scowled. _What is that slimy lizard up to now?_

"Xizor," the Princess spat disdainfully. "That scummy 'Dark Prince' is just making opportunities to suck up to the Emperor now."

Solo snorted. "I almost makes you wish for the days when it was just Vader hunting us down, doesn't it?"

Vader was livid enough to lose the conversation for a few minutes. _Xizor__! I should've found an excuse to kill that reptilian worm ages ago! What is he playing at now? Surely he's not so stupid as to believe he can assume my old position as Palpatine's right hand. He's as Force-blind as a rock!_ Shaking his head, he forced his attention back to eavesdropping.

"…drop point to find the next rendezvous," the Princess was saying.

"Where is it?" Solo asked.

"It should be…" The Princess trailed off as she concentrated on her answer. "The message should be left…here." She was probably pointing at some system listed on the NavComp.

"Great," Solo muttered sarcastically. "We'll have to land a refuel before we can make it there. Chewie and me'll get on working out a route."

The Wookiee woofed a soft agreement.

"All right, I'll leave you two to it." The Princess started to walk back to the main cabin. "I'll go make sure that Threepio isn't boring our passenger to death."

Vader turned away from the cockpit and feign boredom while he churned over what he'd heard. _So, the Rebels have been exposed by Xizor and Black Sun, and have scattered to the stellar winds for the time being. The Princess and Solo now have to locate a message at a secret Rebel drop point to learn the location of the next rendezvous. Now where exactly does that leave me?_

"There's been a change of plans," the Princess announced as she returned to the dejarik table. "The rendezvous point has been changed and it could take up to a week for us to rejoin the Alliance."

"Oh dear," Threepio whimpered. "I hope that Artoo and Master Luke are all right."

"I'm sure that they're fine," she distractedly reassured the fussy protocol droid.

"I do hope so," Threepio fretted. "I just don't know what I would do without Artoo. Or Master Luke," the droid added. "Oh my!"

Threepio was thoroughly ignored by the Princess, who appeared to be in deep thought about something. Vader ignored the protocol droid's continued quiet worry in favor of studying the pensive girl. Before he'd only seen her when she was captured, a prisoner, when she tortured and in pain. It was very…odd…to see her in such an…ordinary setting.

It was also strange to see her with his own eyes, free of the red-tinted distortion imposed by the digital lenses of his old mask. It was strange to hear her voice with his own ears instead of the tinny version produced by the speakers inside his old helmet. It was strange, but he couldn't say that he minded. He'd missed all the other colors of the rainbow and the richness of clear sound. And he thought it was fantastic that he wasn't dependant on that respirator anymore, hearing its constant hiss day in and day out was enough to drive any man insane.

_There's something familiar about her,_ Vader decided uneasily as he watched the Princess stare at the fall wall in deep thought. There was something about her face, the way she carried herself, the way that she behaved. It had nagged at him a few times before, but now that he was trapped on the same ship with her, without the distractions and barriers of his life support suit, the feeling that he should know her was so much stronger, so much clearer.

_Is there something that I'm miss—_

A chill raced up his spine and suddenly the hum and vibrations of the _Millennium Falcon_ were light-years away. He was in a black place within him mind, the place where his Force-bond with Sidious was attached. The Emperor rarely used it anymore, not when he could use the holo-com to make his ugly wrinkled face enormous and loom it over his half-mechanical servant.

**Lord Vader,** Sidious's "voice" boomed, **you're alive.**

_For now,_ Vader replied.

**After your accident, I was unable to find you and I feared the worst, old friend.**

_What of the report I've heard?_

**Report?**

_That you have declared me a traitor, a defector to the Rebel Alliance._

**That was a misunderstanding. There had been reports that an imposter claiming to be you had smuggled secrets to the Rebels.**

Vader didn't believe a word of it.

**What measures are they taking to imprison you? I would think that you would have escaped from their clutches months ago.**

_I was drugged into a coma most of the time. At the moment, I am being transported by non-medical personnel, so they cannot drug me without risking my health._

**I see. Lord Vader, you must do what you can to return to friendly lines. Xizor is not an adequate replacement, even temporarily, for your services.**

_I'm sure that he isn't._

**Do your best to return to me soon, Lord Vader.**

Vader didn't answer. He retreated from the bond, and Sidious didn't seem to care to pull him back. When he sensed that the Emperor had withdrawn his attention, he got to work.

The bond that Sidious had planted in his mind was not like the training bond of the Jedi Order. It was like a fungus. It had deep roots into his mind that always seemed to keep growing. Vader had been forced to meditate a great deal more than he ever had as a Jedi, partly just to keep up with Sidious's creeping invasion into his brain. And now he decided that he was tired of it.

Bit by bit, root by root, filament by filament, he tugged the weed of a Force-bond out. It was exhausting, and it took forever, but if he wasn't careful Sidious would noticed what he was doing, and it would be an all-out mental war. With how week and flimsy he'd felt since his medical procedures, he wasn't interested in getting into any kind of slugging match with the Emperor.

After picking out all the small threads, the twisted knots and vaporous bits, it was time to move on to the larger roots. That step took longer, as the thicker the bond "root" was, the more noticeable it was when it was pulled out. And then there was only the main root left.

With one final "yank," Vader severed it, and the entire Force-bond, with Darth Sidious. It left him dizzy, spinning free in the Force. Clenching his teeth, he forced up mental barriers over the weak space in his mind, the place where the Force-bond had been moments before. With the hole patched, he allowed himself a moment of celebration.

_I am no one's slave…never again._

* * *

Leia wanted to do something that she hadn't done in a long time, since she was a small child. She wanted to throw a temper tantrum and scream her head off. However, being a mature adult, that was no longer an option.

It wasn't fair, though. As if they hadn't suffered through enough trouble in retrieving Vader from the asteroid station, now the Alliance was scattered to the four corners of the galaxy because of an ambitious Falleen and they were alone. Now they had to cart Vader around for up to another week before they had any hope of getting rid of him. Really, it wasn't fair!

_The Alliance has suffered setback before,_ she reminded herself, _like Hoth._

But this wasn't like the rout at Hoth. This was worse. They had one of the single most dangerous men in their custody, and the Alliance wasn't even in a state to do anything with him. Vader could decide he didn't want to be their "guest" at any time and just leave. Worse, he could slaughter them all, and then leave.

_I don't like this, I don't like this at all. Sure, he's behaving himself now, but stars only now how long that will last. Ugh…I hate this!_

Finally shaking herself out of her thoughts, she turned to study her unwanted "guest." He was slumped on the other side of the fidgeting Threepio, staring sightlessly at the checkered pattern of the dejarik table top. He was so still and his breathing so even that she almost thought that he'd fallen asleep with his eyes still half-open. But the sweat beaded on his brow and the trembling of his clenched fists ruined that illusion.

_He's up to something,_ she realized, _I can feel it. But what? It could be anything. He could even be whispering to Emperor Palpatine right now._ She exhaled in frustration. _Oh, I wish Luke was here. He'd at least have a clue about what's going on…_

Abruptly Vader's posture stiffened, and then relaxed just as quickly. His breathing shifted into a ragged pant and he blinked, looking around as if disoriented. Whatever he had been doing, he was done.

Before Leia could comment, Threepio caught on to the change into the human next to him and jumped at something to do. "Are you all right, sir?"

Vader started. "I-I'm fine. Just…tired."

"Is there anything I can do for you, sir?"

"No, Threepio," Vader muttered and struggled to his feet. "I think I'm just going to lay down for a while."

Leia slipped around the table to support Vader before he melted into the _Falcon_'s grimy floor. He didn't seem to notice when she took his arm and some of his weight, he just kept stumbling towards his room. Whatever he'd done, it had worn him out completely.

She saw him to his room and locked the door behind him. With him safely confined for the time being, she wandered back to the dejarik table and returned to thinking. Although the focus of her thinking had shifted from unfair situations and setbacks, to contemplating Vader's mystery exercise with the Force.

_What the hell was he doing?_

* * *

Darth Sidious was…disappointed when he sensed his bond with Vader vanish. Vader had been clever, taking it apart slowly and cautious to prevent any suspicion until it was too late. No doubt that he had strengthened his shields to cover for the weakness as well. It would take a great deal of work to win his prized pawn back.

_No matter,_ Sidious decided. _It's more interesting this way. It's been a long time since I've had a real challenge…_

The Sith Master slowly rose up from his throne and hobbled along on his black walking stick on a meandering route through his grand Imperial Palace. _At least I know Lord Vader is still alive…_

For a long time he hadn't known for sure. He had wasted a great deal of time, money, and other resources in trying to reacquire his favored pawn. He had been so distracted by this problem, that he hadn't made it to the Death Star at Endor. The Rebels beat him there before he could lay his trap with the superlaser and it had been destroyed.

It was a highly irritating setback. He'd sunk a lot of money into the new and improved superweapon. However, there were other options he could look into. Perhaps it was time to pay the secret Maw Instillation of Tarkin's a visit. The late Grand Moff had passed along some interesting hints at the things being cooked up there before he left on the doomed inaugural mission of the first Death Star station.

Sidious pressed a hidden panel in one of the maze-like hallways and stepped into the hidden lift concealed in the wall. After the scanner confirmed his fingerprints and authorization code, he selected the lowest of the secret levels it had access to and waited. Before he traversed to the Maw, he had a secret project or two to check on much closer at hand.

The lift eventually opened into a dimly lit medical chamber, manned only by medical droids. There were no flesh-and-blood doctors he would trust with this project. Originally, the room had housed a Spaarti cloning cylinder and a framed ysalmir to aid the project's swift, healthy growth. It had been very hard to acquire the genetic material to create this thing, there had been barely enough to use in the cylinder. There wasn't enough left to try again if it had failed.

Thankfully, the creation was successful, mutation free, and had been released only three months before, just after the destruction of the second Death Star. Now the Spaarti chamber had been moved elsewhere, and the room housed a Bacta tank. The project's training was harsh, and it was still young for all its body's physical maturity. At the moment, it was undergoing healing, floating peacefully in the sticky healing gel.

When Sidious had conceived of the project, he had intended it as a gift for Lord Vader. Now that Vader had cut ties with him, it had become a much more valuable asset, a pawn that hopefully would be the catalyst to bring his apprentice back to his side. And if not, well, he found it to be a most…poetic way to dispose of the Jedi's fabled "Chosen One."

_You have made a terrible mistake Lord Vader. Hopefully you will see the error of your ways…before it is too late. After all, if you refuse to come to my side, your son will…_


	6. Anakin Starkiller

**Chapter 6  
**_Anakin Starkiller_

_Anakin found himself in the Jedi Temple again. That was more than enough to tell him that he was dreaming again. He immediately decided that he didn't like this dream because all recurring dreams were bad news in his experience._

_Shuddering in the empty halls he hesitated before making his way to the Council chambers. That was where he'd gone last time so it was where he was supposed to go this time. His dreams were always like that, repetition of terrible things that he couldn't change._

_He would go the Council room and find Kenobi. They would argue and he would storm off. And then the dream would end and he could wake up and get on with things._

_Once he ran through the cycle of the dream he'd wake up in his cabin aboard the _Millennium Falcon_. Then it would be back to stewing in isolation, like he'd done for the past few days. It was something that he now had at least a full month to do until he would learn his fate._

_This had to be a punishment straight from the Force. Only It could do this to him, giving him a full month of waiting to know how he was going to die and trapping him in the company of his greatest enemies. It loved to see Its Chosen One suffer._

_The Council chamber looked empty at first glance, but he knew Kenobi would come. Scowling, he slunk over the chair that Palpatine had forced the Council to give him and sat in it. He'd only held it for a few days and that was just long enough for him to wonder if it was worth the trouble…_

_"Hello there."_

_Anakin jumped a bit and turned to see Kenobi sitting in his Council seat just as he had done when he was alive. Again he was a glimpse of the past, General Kenobi of the Clone Wars, the famous Negotiator. And again he had the sad eyes of a tired old man._

_"Hello yourself," Anakin growled, unnerved. Maybe this wasn't a recurring dream after all, just a similar one. Just because the setting was the same didn't mean that the content would be._

_"How are you faring?" Kenobi asked._

_"Why should I answer you?" Anakin frowned._

_"Why not? What's the harm in it?" Kenobi countered calmly, looking infuriatingly serene even with his ancient gray eyes._

_Anakin twisted away from his old Master and glared at the patterns in the floor. "Not too great," he mumbled, almost against his will. "I'm trapped on a tiny ship, surrounded by enemies."_

_"Are they really your enemies?" Kenobi inquired._

_"Of course they are. What sort of stupid question is that?" Anakin sneered, idly scuffing the heel of his boot against the shiny floor._

_Kenobi sighed. "I'm trying to help you, Anakin." _

_A harsh bitter laugh tore from his throat. "You never helped me," Anakin snorted._

_"Never?" Kenobi repeated skeptically._

_"Never," Anakin snapped back. "You always held me back!"_

_"At times, yes," Kenobi admitted calmly, "but did you ever imagine that I might have had a reason for doing that?"_

_"Don't you lecture me!" Anakin shouted, lurching to his feet and abandoning his chair. "Don't you talk to me like you ever cared about me! All you cared about was pleasing the other Masters and keeping your promise to Master Qui-Gon! You claimed to love me, yet you cut me down and left me to burn to death instead of being merciful and just killing me! You just wanted to get rid of me because I wouldn't fit in the mold that you wanted me to, because I wouldn't be the obedient little sidekick, **because you never wanted me in the first place!**"_

_He didn't wait to get Kenobi's pathetic rebuttal. He stormed out of the room and into the lift in search of escape. And as he waited for the lift to carry him down into the Temple, away from Obi-Wan, he started to shake._

_His eyes stung and he glared hatefully in Master Kenobi's general direction. It was true, Obi-Wan had never wanted him, he was only a promise to the dying Qui-Gon Jinn, nothing more. He'd never said it out loud before, but it was true._

_"I hate you!" Anakin hissed, his breath catching in his throat. "I hate you!"_

* * *

Monotony was not something that agreed with him. He couldn't stand it. When he experienced it, it had a tendency to drive him insane.

Vader lay on his bunk and stared at the far wall, deadly bored. For a good week he'd done absolutely nothing but eat, sleep, and think. While it had been productive in a way, he was thoroughly sick of it.

Solo and the Princess had, at some point, retrieved the message left behind for them and presumably any Rebel who hadn't been present at the dispersal at the last rendezvous point. And according to that message, the Rebels wouldn't reconvene in large numbers for at least another month. One whole month stuck on the _Millennium Falcon_, at least. It was not something that brought him any joy.

Although, there had been at least one good development for him during the week. When the _Falcon_ had landed for refueling, the Princess had stopped off at a nearby pawn shop and picked him up some clothes. They were old, cheap, and didn't fit quite right, but they were a vast improvement from the bathrobe that he'd been living in before. Still, he made it a point to complain. He was not a gypsy spacer and he did not enjoy dressing like one.

He couldn't stay here much longer. Even though he was still pathetically weak, he didn't dare linger in the company of the Rebels any longer than he absolutely had to. If he stuck around too long, the Rebel leaders would get their act together and unleash their righteous wrath upon him. That would be decidedly bad for his recently restored health.

Where he would go from here, though, was something he couldn't quite pin down.

He couldn't go back to the Empire and Palpatine; that was for sure. The wicked old man had made him a traitor again and stripped him of what little he'd possessed after the fall of the Old Republic. His status, his power, his command, his resources, all of it was gone, out of his reach. The only thing that brought him any measure of cheer was his freedom from the mental chain that had bound him to the decaying turncoat. He was free from that rotten old man forever. And he was glad.

And nowhere else came to mind. Tatooine barely flickered through his thoughts. That ball of heat and sand and had been nothing but pain and suffering for him. Naboo he pushed from his mind just as quickly. It only held memories gone sour of a life that was no longer his. Coruscant was impossible, it was the very heart of the Empire now. And he'd never really belonged there before, he certainly didn't now. Not after what he'd done during the—

Growling he rolled off the bunk and ran through some stretches. He'd been cooped up in this room far too long. Avoiding contact with the Princess, Solo, and his Wookiee, wasn't worth losing his sanity. To escape his thoughts, he would have to…interact with them.

With another growl, he straightened his threadbare excuse for a shirt and tricked open the door. Taking a step out into the hall he nearly collided with Solo. The Corellian jumped and cursed in surprise. Vader mentally cursed himself for not timing his escape a little better.

"Do you always sneak up on people like that?" Solo snapped, embarrassed at being blind-sided on his own ship.

"I wasn't trying to sneak up on you," Vader frowned in annoyance.

"Sure," Solo snorted sarcastically. The Corellian's dark eyes narrowed in suspicion and Vader felt the little hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He was absurdly glad to have those little hairs back.

"I wasn't," Vader insisted quietly and tried to edge around the scruffy smuggler.

"Right," Solo snorted again and shifted to block his escape. "Tell me, who are you exactly?"

"Why do you care?" Vader muttered, struggling to hide his unease under a mask of calm indifference.

"This is my ship," Solo scowled, "and I like to know who's on it. If her Worshipfulness won't tell me, I'll find out from you."

_Her Worshipfulness?_ Vader stared blankly at Solo. _Is 'worshipfulness' even a word?_

"Quit starin' and answer my question!" Solo demanded; his expression darkened as his patience frayed.

"It's none of your business," Vader growled. _If he finds out, he'll shot me, and then it'll be over…_

"If you don't tell me who you are," Solo growled in some pathetic attempt to intimidate him, "I will shove you out the airlock—"

"His name is Anakin," the Princess interrupted from somewhere behind them.

Vader paled.

* * *

Leia had spent the week avoiding Han. She busied herself with paperwork and reports, hiding away in one of the _Falcon_'s cabins. If she didn't, Han would undoubtedly pester her about their mystery passenger and she just didn't want to deal with it.

Han had caught on to what she was doing and had gotten very annoyed. He wanted to know just who he'd let on his ship, and he'd go to whatever lengths were necessary to find out. But she did get him to promise to leave their passenger alone in his cabin, so at the very least Vader would be safe in there. So, frustrated and sulking, he spent all of his time tinkering with the _Falcon_, though that was limited by the fact that they were currently in hyperspace and not too many systems could be fiddled with.

However, her reports couldn't save her from Han and his questions forever. She'd nearly run out of work and patience, so a break was in order to preserve her sanity. And of course just when she decided to take her break, things went wrong.

She saw that Han had trapped Vader just outside his cabin and was trying to pry the information he desired out of the man. Vader, of course, was resisting and consequently driving Han crazy. She had to intervene before one tried to hurt the other. And that's just what she did.

"His name is Anakin," Leia interrupted, surprising herself a little at telling the truth.

"Anakin?" Han frowned, jerking his head around to stare at her. "Anakin who?"

"Anakin Starkiller," she replied, pulling the surname out of thin air.

Han's frown turned puzzled. "What's so top-secret about this guy that you couldn't tell me his name? I've never heard of any 'Anakin Starkiller' before."

"The High Council is just being cautious," Leia grumbled. "With all the spies and Black Sun agents that have penetrated the Alliance, they aren't taking any chances with anything."

"Right," Han snorted. He really didn't believe that thin excuse, but it was enough for him to back off for the moment. Giving Vader one last skeptical stare, Han turned and stalked towards the bridge.

As soon as Han was out of sight, she reluctantly put her hands on Vader's shoulders and shoved him towards the main cabin. Vader moved stiffly, haltingly, like a droid running out of power with stiff joints. But at least he moved and she was able to get him to the dejarik table.

She left him there and set Threepio to making some caf. While she waited for the fussy golden droid to return, she leaned up against the main cabin bulkhead that was farthest away from the dejarik table and Vader. The entire time she could feel his eyes on her.

"Anakin Starkiller," he said slowly in a quiet, flat voice.

Leia casually studied her nails to avoid having to look at him. "I didn't hear you coming up with anything."

"Anakin _Starkiller_," he repeated as if she hadn't spoken a word, drawing out 'Starkiller' with great disdain as he said it.

She looked up and pinned him with one of her coldest stares. "My previous statement stands."

He stared back with a chilling, slow-burning anger flickering in his blue eyes. There were moments when she swore she could see actual yellow sparks darting through his irises. The air in the cabin grew cold and heavy, and Leia decided that she'd had enough of his attitude.

"Would you have preferred if I told Han that your name was Anakin Skywalker?" She asked with sharp sweetness.

Vader blanched in shock. "What?"

"Don't be so surprised," Leia snorted. "Luke doesn't keep secrets from me." _Not for very long, anyway._

He stared at her, his face an open, but barely legible, book. Emotions flitted over it slowly, though she could only guess at what some of them were. She saw shock, some degree of thoughtfulness, and then a shade of anger, with the rest being unidentifiable.

"Can't even trust family anymore," he spat bitterly.

Leia was tempted to gag at all the disgusting layers of irony she found in that statement, but she kept it to herself. "You can trust Luke with anything," she frowned. "I do."

"Trust is an illusion," he sneered. "You're a fool if you put any stock in it."

"Trust is only an illusion where there never was trust in the first place," she countered coolly.

"With people like you in charge, I'm surprised that the Rebellion has lasted as long as it has." Vader sniffed mockingly.

Leia was glad that she was standing so far away from him when he said that. If she'd been close enough, she would've punched him in the head as hard as she could. "What surprises me," she shot back icily, "is that a sweet, compassionate, young man like Luke is in any way related to a bitter, vindictive, bastard like you."

"Such language Princess," he scolded, again in a mocking tone, "what would your father say?"

Somehow, she wasn't quite sure how, Leia managed to smother the bitter laugh that his choice of phrase generated. "I don't know, what would he say?" _Really, **you** tell **me**!_

Vader seemed a little thrown at her response, and before he could recover, Threepio appeared with the caf that Leia had asked for. "Princess Leia, General Solo says that we'll be dropping out of light speed soon," the golden droid announced, completely oblivious to the tension thick in the room.

"Thank you Threepio," Leia smiled tightly and retrieved her cup of caf from the droid's grasp. "Would you like some?" She asked Vader with forced politeness.

"No," Vader replied tensely, pointedly looking away from her.

"Suit yourself," Leia shrugged and sipped at her caf. "I'm going to the bridge. Threepio, stay here."

"Of course, Princess," Threepio gave a stiff bow as she passed him.

She barely nodded to him in reply as she made her way to the bridge. Soon they'd be somewhere, she wasn't sure exactly where. It wouldn't be the rendezvous point; that was still several weeks away. But it would be somewhere new, and that's what counted.

_A change in scenery is what we need,_ Leia decided. _Before we all contract cabin fever and kill each other…_

* * *

Vader idly traced the black and white dejarik board pattern with a fingertip as the _Millennium Falcon_ vibrated around him. Judging by the intensity of the vibrations, he guessed that they were entering the atmosphere of a planet. But he really wasn't concerned with that. What really bothered him was the Princess.

For one thing she knew exactly who he was, which he found deeply unnerving. She hadn't even been born when he had been in his Jedi prime, and by the time she was old enough to know about the Clone Wars, Anakin Skywalker's memory had been expunged from most of the written records. He seriously doubted that Viceroy Organa had risked keeping old Holos of the war to show his daughter, and that left only one source of information about himself available to her.

Luke had told her about him. She'd admitted as much. His own son had betrayed his confidence and gone and told the royalty that he admired all his secrets.

_What is it with Skywalkers and royalty?_ He wondered bitterly. _And it's not like Luke even has a chance with her. She's hopelessly enamored with Solo…when they're not too busy fighting with each other._

And then there was her unexpected reaction to his taunt about her father. What he'd expected was for her to physically attack him or verbally explode on him. Instead she fired the taunting question right back at him and he almost got the feeling that she found it funny.

From all that he knew of her, the Princess was deeply attached to her father. He recalled one time when he'd met with Bail Organa on Alderaan in particular. He'd arrived early and Bail Organa boldly ignored him until it was time for the meeting. The Alderaanian Viceroy spent a half hour playing with his daughter and when it was finally time to leave her behind, the Princess whined and cried and threw a fit at having her father stolen away from her.

Now that Bail was dead, he expected her to be more attached to and protective of his memory. But here she'd treated his grave insult upon her and his cruel jab at her beloved father's memory like it was a great joke. That didn't fit right in his mind, and it bothered him.

There was a tremendous jolt and then the worst of the vibrating stopped. It seemed that they had landed somewhere. Vader sighed and undid his crash belt.

"Thank goodness we've landed safely," Threepio sighed in relief as he too unbuckled and got up.

Vader ignored the golden droid. Even though he appeared to have undergone a mind-wipe, Threepio was still Threepio. And Threepio would fuss over anything and everything.

Before the protocol droid could fuss anymore, Solo, his Wookiee, and the Princess appeared. Solo and his Wookiee cast him wary gazes, filled with suspicion. The Princess looked more annoyed than anything else.

"Threepio, stay here and guard the ship," Solo ordered. "You" – he pointed at Vader – "come with us."

Having no reasonable excuse not to, Vader gave a curt nod and fell in step behind them. The four of them crept down the ramp and Vader grew annoyed at how much he had to bend to keep from banging his head on the underside of the _Falcon_. When he cleared the overhanging hull of the flatten freighter, he straightened up and surveyed his new environment.

The landscape was wide and open, a rolling expanse of purple-tinged grass. It was twilight here; night was approaching, even though it barely felt like afternoon to him. The air was fresh and clean and laced with the faint fragrance of the nearby vegetation. He knew this place.

"Any reason why you picked Dantooine, Nerf-herder?" the Princess sighed.

"The Alliance hasn't been here for years, and the Empire knows it, so they wouldn't expect us to come back and stay a while," Solo explained, apparently very proud of his masterful leap in logic.

"Right," the Princess snorted, "what's the real reason?"

"That _is _the real reason," Solo insisted and Vader could tell he was lying, even without the Wookiee's howl of denial. "Oh fine, fine!" Solo grumbled. "The Rogues sent me a message that said they'd be here and they were going to have a sabacc tournament."

The Princess rolled her eyes at him and walked on, away from the _Falcon_. Solo grumbled something in Corellian and trudged after her with his chuckling Wookiee companion at his side. Vader brought up the rear, casually strolling along behind them.

Over a nearby rise, there was a large depression in the prairie filled with a full squadron of X-wing fighters. The starfighters were arranged in a wide ragged circle, at the center of which were several glowing campfires. Between the fires and the X-wings were a scattering of field tents, a squadron's worth of Astromechs, and a squadron's worth of pilots.

Solo, the Wookiee, and the Princess picked their way down the hillside towards the camp without hesitation. Vader was a little more reluctant. Dantooine was a very remote world with a very small, scattered population. If things went bad for him here, there was little chance for escape and no one that would help him.

"Oh look who decided to come and join us!" one of the pilots called after they'd passed through the circle of X-wings.

"You're just in time, General!" another pilot laughed. "We're just setting up the brackets now."

"Glad you decided to wait for me," Solo grumbled as he headed for the cluster of pilots who were setting up the tournament.

"Are you going to play, Princess?" a third pilot asked.

"No, thank you Tycho," the Princess smiled. "I think I'll keep my money and just watch."

"Alright," Tycho nodded, accepting her answer without argument.

"And what about you, do you want to play?" yet another pilot asked, directing his question at Vader.

"Sorry, I'm broke," Vader replied tersely.

"You can play on credit," the eager pilot suggested hopefully, "worry about paying up later."

"No," Vader replied flatly and moved away to the campfire most distant from the crowd.

Thankfully none of the Rebel pilots felt like pursuing him. Vader settled down beside the small fire and eyed the flickering flames with some anxiety. Fire no longer held any fascination or beauty for him, not after he'd burned alive on Mustafar.

_This isn't a river of lava_, he reminded himself. _It's just a little campfire. It can't hurt me unless I decide to roll in it._

"Hello, father."

Vader flinched in surprise and looked up from the fire to see a reflection of his own blue eyes staring back at him through the hazy smoke…


	7. Tension

**Chapter 7  
**_Tension_

Vader was startled. The last time that he'd laid eyes upon his son, the boy had chosen to leap down the shaft in the bowels of Cloud City rather than accept his hand. Luke had vehemently denied his true heritage, and now here he was…accepting it?

"So, you have accepted the truth," Vader replied once he had regained his composure.

"I have accepted the truth that you were once Anakin Skywalker, my father," Luke countered calmly.

"That name no longer has any meaning for me!" Vader snapped instinctively.

Luke didn't so much as flinch. "Doesn't it? It is the name of your true self, you've only forgotten." He was so calm, so self-assured, it put a bitter taste in the back of Vader's throat.

"I haven't forgotten!" Vader snapped. "That name is buried in the past; it is dead; it no longer holds any meaning for me."

Luke forged on as if Vader hadn't said anything. "I know there is good in you," he calmly declared. "The Emperor hasn't driven it from you fully."

"What makes you say that?" Vader sneered, tugging his worn black leather jacket tighter over his shoulders.

"I sensed it on Bespin," Luke replied. "Why else would you try so hard to spare me when it would've been so easy for you to simply kill me?"

"If I had killed you, I would have destroyed my strongest ally," Vader snorted. "I needed you to help me remove Palpatine. And besides, there are always two: a master and an apprentice."

"I will not turn," Luke responded calmly with a shrug and his blue eyes dropped down to contemplate the flickering flames.

"I never thought I would," Vader shot back, and immediately wished that he hadn't.

Luke poked at the campfire, sending up a burst of sparks that made Vader flinch. "It's not too late to come back. I feel the conflict within you, father," he murmured gently. "Let go of your hate."

"It's too late for me, son," Vader spat bitterly. "All the great Jedi Masters were in agreement about those that turned. 'Once you go down the Dark Path, forever will it dominate your destiny.'"

"They may have been great, but who's to say that they could've been wrong?" Luke asked, still the calm, unruffled young Jedi. "There are always a few exceptions to the rule. All you have to do is try."

"'Do or do not!'" Vader snapped back, cruelly quoting Master Yoda's favorite saying. "'There is no try.'"

Luke shrugged. "Well, then do it."

Vader clenched his teeth in frustration. "That's much easier said than done, son."

"I never said anything about it being easy," Luke returned. "If it was easy, then there wouldn't be such a stigma attached to falling to the Dark Side in the first place. If it was that easy to come back, then why fear falling at all?"

Vader stared at his son through the smoke and flames and wondered. Where had the brash, angry youth that he had met on Bespin gone? Where had this _Jedi_ come from with the stoic calm and philosophical riddles that had always infuriated him?

"The Jedi were weak," Vader growled. "It took less than one Standard day to crush their mighty Order into oblivion, and only a few years to mop up the cowards who'd run off with their lives."

There was a long pause and Vader could sense a dull surge of anger in his son; it was almost enough to make him smile.

"I don't know enough about the Clone Wars to properly answer that," Luke said at last. "But I doubt that a lack of strength was what did the Jedi Order in." Luke peered up from the flames to peer at Vader through the smoke with narrowed eyes. "The only way that I can see something as strong as the Jedi Order was falling as it did is because of a traitor."

If there hadn't been a campfire between them, Vader would've lunged forward and decked his son. "_They_ were the traitors!" he snarled.

"Why would they betray the Republic that they had faithfully served for so long?" Luke asked.

"They were afraid of losing their power," Vader replied. "During the war they gained a great deal of authority, and if the war were to end, they would lose all that they had gained."

Luke shook his head. "I don't believe that."

"You should," Vader snorted. "It's the truth."

"Whose truth? Palpatine's?" the Princess interjected, appearing at Vader's side. "It certainly sounds like the kind of garbage he'd spew."

"You being a leader of a terrorist organization, I'm not at all surprised at your faulty opinion," Vader sneered.

The Princess squatted down to stare him right in the eye. "If anyone is a terrorist, I would have to say that the Empire is, not the Alliance. Or have you forgotten Alderaan? Several hundred _million_ innocent civilians and hundreds of _thousands_ of years of history, an _entire planet_, all erased in a millisecond. And the very reason that that act of _genocide_ was done was to generate fear." She rocked back on her heels and folded her arms over her chest. "Now _you_ tell _me_ that the Alliance is a pack of mad terrorists and that the Empire is a free and just society."

"It would be if your rebellion didn't keep stirring up trouble," Vader retorted. "You have no idea how much money the Empire wastes on building up the military and chasing you all down. Without your meddling, funds could be diverted to more worth-while causes like education and healthcare."

"You actually believe that?" she asked him skeptically.

"Even after all that he's done to you?" Luke added quietly.

Vader narrowed his eyes at his son. "What are you referring to?"

"Leia told me about all the medical work that you had done," Luke answered. "And she told me how the Emperor could've done it for you years ago, and he didn't. He's even passed legislation that makes most of your reconstruction illegal."

Again, Vader wanted to hit his offspring. Trust his son – his _Jedi_ son – to exploit any soft spot that he could find. Before Vader could formulate something properly scathing to fire back, the Princess blind-sided him with something worse.

"What I don't get is why you're still defending him," she sniffed. "Palpatine used you as his right-hand minion for over two decades and then cuts you off and calls you a traitor for something that you didn't have any control over. If I were you (thank the stars that I'm not!) I wouldn't be doing that man any favors."

Vader wasn't sure who to lash out at first: the haughty Rebel princess, or his nerve-grating Jedi son. He worked his jaw and tried to find the words to attack either one, but nothing was coming. Apparently reading his silence as defeat, the Princess turned away from him to address Luke.

"They're about to start the first game, Luke. They want you to observe and watch for any cheating."

"All they do is cheat," Luke snorted and stood up. "If they didn't cheat like crazy, they wouldn't have as much fun. They just want me around so they can joke with me."

"Humor them," the Princess commanded as she walked around the small fire to stand beside him. "Otherwise they'll complain all night, probably loud enough for you to hear all the way over here."

"I will," Luke promised, abruptly dropping his stoic Jedi mask to flash her an innocent, boyish smile. The smile vanished for a moment as he turned back to Vader again. "You can come with us if you like."

Vader glared at them. "I think I'll stay here."

"Alright," Luke shrugged. "We'll save some dinner for you."

And then the two of them walked off towards the others, hand in hand.

Vader watched them until they settled around the cluster of campfires at the opposite side of the ring formed by the parked X-Wings. Then he turned his attention back to his own small fire and sighed. Without the constant verbal sparring, he was able to relax and get his head back in order.

_Why **was** I defending Palpatine?_ he mused as he got his emotions back under control. _It must've been a reflex,_ he decided after some thought. Even though he rarely agreed with anything that the Emperor said or did anymore, not even he dared speak out against the Sith Master. If he did, it meant a burst or two of agonizing Force lightning—enough to hurt a lot, but not enough to do fatal damage to his life support suit. _I must remember to not do that anymore, otherwise the Rebel soldiers will recognize me as an Imperial…and they will treat me accordingly._

His expression turned sour as he reflected on the things that his son had said. _Was I ever so foolish?_ he wondered bitterly. _There's no way back for me. And I don't want to go back. The Darkness is so much easier, so much more powerful. It's a pity that Luke is too blinded by Kenobi's narrow Jedi teachings to see that…_

A log broke apart in the campfire and sent up a shower of sparks that had Vader scrambling back a few steps. Catching his breath, he shook his head at his silly reaction. However, it took several long minutes of the cool night air to drive him back closer to the warm flames.

Twisting his anxious thoughts away from the fire, he shifted his focus to his son and the princess holding hands as they left him. _Really, what is it with Skywalkers and royalty?_ He glanced over at the laughing cluster of Rebel pilots and let his gaze rest on the princess as she sat between Solo and his son. _I wish she'd make up her mind on who she wants. It's not fair of her to lead Luke on that way. She has to make a solid choice and stick with it. It's either Solo or Luke. And being a princess, she is much more compatible with a Jedi than with a smuggler._

Vader yawned, suddenly feeling weary. _I almost wish that Bail Organa was still alive. He was a criminal, a Rebel, but maybe he could talk some sense into his daughter…_

* * *

The sabacc tournament went on for a few hours until the demand for food put a temporary halt to the card play. In addition to the unpleasant military rations at their disposal, the Rogues broke out other foodstuffs that they acquired from various, unnamed sources. Soon, they were roasting Nerf sausages over the campfires, popping dried maize kernels with the coals, and munching slices of pallie fruit. It was a tasty meal, and the whole mood was more of that of a camping trip than a brief stopover by a group on the run.

Luke sat down with his sister a little ways away from the others so that they could talk without being overheard. "So, how are you holding up?"

"Not so well," she sighed. "I didn't think we'd be stuck with him for so long." She shook her head wearily. "But at least he spends most of his time in his cabin so it's easier to avoid him."

"I wish I could stay on the _Falcon _with you to help you out," Luke smiled in weak apology. "But I don't want to leave Artoo alone in my X-Wing if a combat situation comes up."

"If only I was half the combat pilot that you are, Luke," she complained. "Then I'd swap places with you."

Luke nodded his head in the general direction of their father. "How is he doing?"

"About as well as I am," she snorted and bit ferociously into her pallie. "When he isn't in his cabin, he just sits at the dejarik table and glares at everyone but Threepio." She pressed a hand to her forehead as if to force back a headache by sheer willpower. "His simple presence irritates Han, and with some of the things that Vader says, I'm sorely tempted to just shoot him myself and get it over with."

"Shoot him?" he frowned worriedly. "Leia—"

"Don't worry, I won't shoot him unless he tries to kill me first," she assured him. "It's just…well…_him_!"

Luke nodded in understanding. Their father had done far worse things to her than he had to him. Leia had suffered torture at Darth Vader's hands and been held witness by him at the death of her home-world and the only father that she'd ever known. And then Vader had tormented her lover, Han Solo, before encasing him in carbonite and leaving him for Jabba the Hutt. With such ugly history between them, Luke could understand why she had such a hard time dealing with him and accepting his true relation to her.

"Look on the bright side," he suggested. "It'll only be for a few more weeks, and then the Alliance will assemble again and he'll be out of your hair."

"I'm surprised that I made it this long, Luke," she grunted. "I honestly don't know how I'm going to last much longer with him."

He reached over and gave her hand a comforting squeeze. "You can do it. You're my sister, after all."

Leia laughed a little at that. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

Luke grinned at her before casting a glance at the huddled figure silhouetted by the distant campfire. "Does he know about you?"

"No," she answered grimly, "and I would prefer it if it would stay that way."

"Leia—"

"It's hard enough to deal with him now," she interrupted. "I don't need him offering me a seat at his right hand if I join him in toppling the Emperor and conquering the galaxy."

Luke shifted uncomfortably. "I see your point, but…one way or another, he's going to figure out some time. He's not stupid."

"I know," she agreed, "but this way it will take him some time to put the pieces together. The longer that he's in the dark, the happier I will be."

He rubbed absently just below his right wrist, at the join between his mechanical prosthetic and the stump of his right arm. "If that's what you want…"

"It is," she assured him.

"All right, I'll keep quiet about it," Luke promised.

She smiled warmly at him. "Thank you."

"Well," Luke set aside his plate and picked up a second one, "I'd better go feed him."

"Good luck," she snorted.

"There's no such thing as luck," he countered cheerfully and struck out for the distant campfire.

As he drew nearer, Luke found that the huddled figure of his father was actually asleep sitting up. Now that he was cracked out of his menacing black life support suit, his father looked…ordinary…very much like any other of a thousand wandering spacers. And he looked so young, barely older than he and his sister—he had to remind himself that this appearance wasn't natural, but the side-effect of his father's numerous medical procedures.

Months ago, when he'd revealed the family secrets to Leia on Endor, Luke hadn't known what had become of his father. Darth Vader had simply vanished from the galaxy without any explanation. After the battle for the shield generator, Leia had taken him aside before the brief victory celebration to let him in on a few secrets of her own. She'd passed along to him Mon Mothma's risky gambit and the true fate of Darth Vader—weeks before the Emperor had gone on the record and declared his servant a traitor. It was wonderful to hear that his father was finally getting the medical help that he'd needed for so long, but at the same time…he couldn't help but worry that it might not turn out the way that Mon Mothma hoped.

_I will do what I can,_ he swore to himself. _Not just for the Alliance, but for my father. With Ben and Yoda gone, he's my last link to the Jedi. And he's my father. I've got to try._

Although he didn't want to disturb his father's rest, his father also had to eat to keep up his recovery, so he knelt down beside him and gently shook his shoulder. At first, his efforts garnered no results, but a second, more vigorous shake woke him right up. His father started awake, flinched away from the fire, and looked around frantically until his eyes landed on Luke and he recalled his situation.

"What do you want?" he asked sourly.

Luke decided that he preferred his father's natural voice over the synthesized version he'd always heard before. His natural voice was more emotional and expressive, even though he was only expressing negative things. He wondered what Leia thought of the difference while simultaneously realizing that it was a subject he probably couldn't get her to touch with a ten foot pole.

"I brought you dinner," Luke replied, offering up the plate of campfire-cooked Nerf sausage and pallie fruit.

His father eyed him and then the plate with suspicion before taking it. He was about to start eating, when he favored Luke with a glare. "What do you want?"

Luke frowned. "What makes you think that I want anything?"

"You're still here," his father answered.

Luke blinked. "So?"

"It means that you want something," he explained. "Otherwise you would have left."

"Don't you want any company?" Luke inquired.

His father scowled. "No."

Luke tilted his head in puzzlement. "Why not?"

"I prefer to eat alone," his father replied.

"That's just so…lonely." Luke settled down on the ground, determined to stick around. "I always like company when I eat, even if the company is less than friendly."

His father grunted something unintelligible and started to eat, but Luke sensed the faintest spark of interest in him.

"Maybe it's a side-effect of growing up on Tatooine," Luke mused as he stared into the fire. "There was never much to do, so no matter how bad I'd fought with Uncle Owen, I'd always show up to dinner, just for the company of other people."

"'Uncle Owen'?" his father repeated after a short pause.

"Owen Lars," Luke elaborated. "I lived with him and Aunt Beru for as long as I can remember and I was never entirely sure of how I was related to them." He frowned as an idea hit him, and he glanced over at his father. "Am I related to them?"

His father took a bite out of his pallie fruit and chewed before responding. "By blood? No. By law? Yes." He shrugged. "He was my step-brother. I met him once. Briefly."

"Really?" Luke asked, unable to contain his interest.

"I never thought much of him," his father snorted. "I'm sure he did well enough as a moisture farmer, but he was an isolationist and a fool. When I left, he asked me to stay. He basically told me to leave Obi-Wan and the galaxy to rot, that it wasn't my problem. He didn't try to understand, he didn't care, all that mattered was keeping up his farm."

Luke blinked in confusion. Earlier his father had scorned the Jedi and called them weak. Now he looked down upon Uncle Owen, and spoke of his duty as a Jedi with pride and mentioned Obi-Wan's name without any bitterness or anger.

"He meant well," Luke shrugged. "I never really got along with him, but he was just looking after me. There are days that I even miss him."

"Then why not visit him?" his father muttered darkly. "You certainly have the time."

Luke shook his head. "He's dead. Stormtroopers killed him and Aunt Beru and set the farm on fire while they were hunting down the droids."

His father's only response was a flat, disinterested, "Oh."

A chill prickled up Luke's spine. While his father didn't really know Uncle Owen or Aunt Beru as family, he could at least relate to them as people. Yet there wasn't a shred of emotion in his father upon hearing of their deaths, not even a shadow of guilt that it was the Empire that had killed them and razed their farm. His father felt nothing at all for his Tatooine relations.

Luke hopped to his feet. "Well, it looks like they're going to start up the cards again soon. Good night." He walked off before his father could respond.

_I will never turn! Not if I'm going to turn out like that…_

* * *

Vader blinked in surprise at his son's hasty departure. He wondered at it for a moment, before shrugging it off as not important. Luke would come back sooner or later. He'd sensed the curiosity in the young man and he knew it would draw him back like a tight chain.

Luke had been much more open than the last time; his Jedi mask was almost completely absent. Vader decided that it had to do with the conversation. Before, their talk had centered on his identity, the Force, and the Empire. This time, it had been about more neutral topics, like family relations.

_If I can keep our talks on neutral ground, give him hints about the past that he is ignorant of, then I can steer him in the proper direction._ This plan brought him a brief sense of satisfaction. However, he quickly noticed a problem. _He'll ask about **her**… Maybe not right away, but some time he will._

He felt a spike of dread and buried it by devouring his pallie fruit. The meal was simple, but it was good; better than what he'd had during most of the Clone Wars. It was certainly better than anything he'd had in his long years trapped in the suit. Really, anything was better than a liquid intravenous diet.

_I have some time,_ he consoled himself. _I'll figure out a way to sway my son to my side. I'll find a way to open his eyes to the truth…_


	8. Ghosts

**Chapter 8  
**_Ghosts_

_Anakin was growing weary of dreaming of the ghost Temple, even though this was only the third time. After his verbal sparring with his son and the Princess, he was in absolutely no mood for messing around with Obi-Wan. So instead of heading for the High Council Chamber, he made for the Room of a Thousand Fountains._

_The cavernous chamber deep in the heart of the Temple was one of the oldest and largest gardens on Coruscant. Filled with numerous artificial waterfalls, ponds, decorative fountains, and countless species of plants, it was the most beautiful area of the Temple. Intended for meditation and communing with nature, it was also a playground for the Temple's Younglings and the Jedi Order's private swimming pool._

_He had always enjoyed this part of the Temple, especially as a child. The sight of all that water and greenery had awed and overwhelmed his Tatooinian senses, and reminded him of verdant Naboo. However, there were times when the tranquil atmosphere of the Fountain Room felt stifling and stagnant to him and he would scamper off to fix or build something to soothe his restless energy._

_When he entered the vast chamber, it was just as he remembered it. The trees were tall and leafy, the grass was green, the flowers were blooming, and the air was filled with the soft hiss of flowing, cascading water. The only difference that he noticed was the complete lack of Jedi, something that probably only happened in the very dead of night. However, the massive sun lamps set high in the arched ceiling were on full blast, giving him the sense that it was noon, not midnight._

_Tugging his dark cloak tighter over his shoulders, he strolled through the eerily deserted room. Every now and then he's pause to admire one of the more intricate fountains or one of the arrangements of exotic plants. Eventually, he reached a small artificial mountain near the center of the chamber that sported several waterfalls which terminated into small, deep pools that circled its base. Gazing up at it, he felt a bitter half smile work its way onto his face as he recalled all the times that he'd climbed it as a young Padawan, and how Obi-Wan had always yelled at him to come down before he broke his neck._

_"There was a time when Obi-Wan used to love this cliff," someone said. "But then he fell, sprained his wrist, and cut open his forehead."_

_Anakin spun around and found one of the last people he was expecting to see. "Master Qui-Gon?" he blinked, stunned. "Sir?"_

_The long-dead Jedi looked just as he had in life. Tall, broad-shouldered, and regal, his dark brown hair in the process of fading to gray, he looked quite alive. It was a change from the last time that Anakin had seen him—laid out on a stone table with a charred hole in his chest, waiting to be set on fire._

_"There's no need to be so formal, Anakin," Master Qui-Gon chuckled._

_"But…you're dead," Anakin managed after a moment._

_Master Qui-Gon smiled in amusement. "Yes, I know."_

_Anakin looked away from the first Jedi he'd ever known and focused on the waterfalls to help gather his scattered thoughts. "I was expecting to see Obi-Wan," he said finally._

_"You probably won't be seeing him for a while," Master Qui-Gon replied. "You hurt his feelings last time."_

_"I hurt his feelings?" Anakin laughed darkly. "He's dead, what's there to hurt?"_

_"Even the dead have feelings, Anakin," Master Qui-Gon chided. "Just because our hearts no longer beat does not mean that they are made of stone."_

_Anakin shrugged and kept his eyes pinned on the misty spray that wafted off the waterfalls._

_Master Qui-Gon sighed deeply. "Although I'm sure that you are already aware of this, the Emperor is moving against you now that you have confirmed your betrayal. What his plans are, we don't know. The Darkness that surrounds him is so deep that not even combining our skills can we pierce it and read the futures that he spins."_

_"Why do you care what he does?" Anakin muttered. "You're dead; he can't do anything to you."_

_"True, he cannot harm the dead. However, there are those still living that I care about that he could." Master Qui-Gon fixed Anakin with a worried look that he struggled to ignore. "Despite all that you have done, I still have faith in you, Anakin; you can still fulfill your destiny."_

_"That destiny is dead, Master," Anakin snapped. "And I never wanted that destiny anyway. It ruined my life!"_

_"I am sorry, Anakin," Master Qui-Gon apologized. "I should have kept my suspicions about your nature to myself instead of declaring them to the galaxy. I should not have laid such a burden upon you the way that I did. Despite all my diplomatic experience, there are times when I speak rashly and come to regret it."_

_"It's a bit late for apologies, isn't it?" Anakin spat bitterly. "After I've laid the Order to waste for a dead woman? Why even bother to apologize? Really, I'd think you should be demanding an apology of me."_

_"I'm not here to demand apologies or cast blame, Anakin," Master Qui-Gon sighed. "I am here to offer guidance and advice if you want it, and warnings whether you want me to or not."_

_"And what are you here to warn me of that I don't already know?" Anakin grumbled._

_"The Chosen One is a prestigious pawn for Sidious to control, and with your body restored, you are more powerful than before. However, now that you are no longer dependant on his medical resources, and now that you are well-versed in his ways, you will be much harder for him to control. If he cannot regain you, he will seek to acquire Luke." Master Qui-Gon hesitated before continuing. "You are aware that Princess Leia is Force-sensitive?"_

_"Yes," Anakin nodded. "What does she have to do with anything?"_

_"Because she is wholly untrained, her strength is difficult to measure without a blood test." Again Master Qui-Gon hesitated, as if he was unsure as to how he should proceed. "Her potential is nearly as great as Luke's, and with her temper and anger towards you, she makes a stronger Sith candidate. If Sidious was to learn of her potential, it is likely that he would concentrate his efforts on her and simply kill your son."_

_Anakin bit his lip as he mulled this over. He hated to admit it, but he hadn't considered the Princess's potential as anything other than an annoyance. His son had always been his first choice as the next Sith apprentice. Luke had incredible potential and he was family—that was all the reason that Anakin had needed. But with her drive, her temper, and the anger that smoldered in her heart, the Princess had the greater potential to be turned._

_He glanced over at the deceased Jedi Master. "Her commitment to her cause is unwavering. She did not betray it when the life of her father and the existence of her home-world was on the line, she will not betray them by turning and serving the Emperor that she so despises."_

_"We all thought the same of you once," Master Qui-Gon responded quietly._

_Anakin shot the Jedi a dark glare. "I'm really starting to hate these dreams."_

_"This is only a dream in the sense that you are asleep at the moment," the Jedi remarked. "I assure you that I am not a creation of your subconscious, nor was Obi-Wan."_

_"So you're real ghosts haunting me in my dreams?" Anakin snorted skeptically._

_"I know you know the Code as well as any of us," Master Qui-Gon smiled faintly. "Remember the last verse: 'There is no death, there is the Force.'"_

_Anakin shifted uneasily. "I don't believe you."_

_"That is your choice," Qui-Gon conceded. "But whether you believe it or not, I still exist—as does Obi-Wan and Yoda."_

_"Sure," Anakin muttered, taking a step away from the Jedi._

_"Ever since my death I've kept my eye on you," the Master continued. "I even tried to speak to you once, in the Tusken camp…but you did not hear me." His expression shifted into one of great disappointment. "I really wish that you hadn't done that. I wish that you had admitted your transgressions to Obi-Wan and not Palpatine. Obi-Wan would've helped you; he loved you. He still loves you."_

_Anakin recoiled more and more from Master Qui-Gon with each sentence until he simply couldn't take it anymore. "You've been dead for decades! What do you know? Leave me alone!"_

_"As you wish," Master Qui-Gon agreed sadly. "If you ever need any of us, you need only call."_

_"I needed you like a hole in the head!" Anakin snarled back. "If you hadn't come to Tatooine and taken me away, I could've protected my mother! And I would've been free of your damned prophecy!"_

_"I'm sorry you feel that way, Ani," Master Qui-Gon sighed and walked away to some other corner of the Fountain Room._

_Anakin stubbornly turned away from the retreating figment of his subconscious imagination and waited to wake up. There was simply no such thing as ghosts. When someone died, they died, end of story. There was nothing else to it. Nothing at—_

* * *

Something solid was nudging his shoulder repeatedly, driving him to wakefulness. Groggily muttering unintelligible curses, he cracked open his eyes and twisted around to squint at his attacker. It took him a few minutes to focus his eyes, and a few more to realize what he was looking at.

"Artoo?" he croaked dazedly. _First Threepio, now Artoo… Who's next? Jar Jar Binks? …Oh Force, I hope not._

The blue and white Astromech warbled something at him and extended one of his delicate manipulation arms to make a beckoning gesture.

Vader sleepily glanced around to find that he was no longer crouched near the campfire. At some point in the night, he'd been moved into a small, triangular tent and wrapped up in a blanket. Artoo's barrel-shaped bulk filled up most of the tent's opening, but enough light seeped in around him to tell Vader that it was now at least midmorning.

He squinted at the familiar droid again. "What is it?"

Artoo sharply repeated the string of electronic whistles and opened a panel in his chest to extend a two-pronged plug. Normally, it functioned as a power umbilical between the droid and the ship it was screwed into. However, Artoo had reversed the polarity of the plug, turning it into a painful shock prod that crackled threateningly at him.

"Hey!" Vader snapped upright, suddenly very awake. "What's that for?!"

Instead of answering in whistles, Artoo started to play an audio recording.

_"Liar!"_ Vader heard himself shout in rage.

_"No!"_ she cried back tearfully in denial.

"Shut it off!" Vader interrupted before it could go any further.

Unlike Threepio, it seemed that Artoo's memory was untouched. Also, Artoo had disobeyed him on Mustafar and not stayed with the ship. But then it was Artoo. The droid had probably detected her arrival with the starfighter's sensors and come to see her.

Electricity stopped crackling on the needle-like prongs, but the plug remained extended as the audio recording cut off.

"All right!" Vader sighed. "I'm up. What? Do you want me to follow you?"

Artoo whistled an affirmative, retracted the threatening plug, and rolled out of the tiny tent to wait beside it.

"I guess that's a yes," Vader muttered.

Not desiring to be threatened by electric shock again, he peeled himself free from his blanket and stiffly crawled out of the tent. Straightening up, he stretched until he heard his joints crack. Wishing for a water shower, he smoothed out his rumpled clothes and pulled on his boots.

"Okay, lead on," he grumbled.

Artoo blatted an electronic raspberry at him and wobbled over the uneven dirt and flattened prairie grass towards the cluster of campfires, Rebels, and the smell of cooking breakfast. Vader followed the droid at a slight distance. He was in no hurry to join up with the Rebels around their fires. However, breakfast smelled very good and he was simply too hungry to resist.

Vader looked to Luke, but found his son at the heart of the Rebel clump. He had no desire for such a high profile position; the key to surviving for now was to keep quiet and unnoticeable. So instead of taking a seat by his son, he settled down beside the princess, who was off to the side away from the others, probably thinking about something.

She was displeased by his presence, but did not outwardly show it. Aside from silently offering him some of the food that had been cooked up, she completely ignored him. Vader didn't mind. In fact, he preferred it that way. Unfortunately, his peaceful breakfast was not to last.

"Hiya Princess!" an entirely too cheerfully voice cried.

Vader glanced up from his plate to find a Rebel pilot standing by their fire. The man was entirely too cheerful. Wracking his brains, Vader could vaguely recall him from the previous night.

"What do you want Wes?" the Princess asked warily.

"Just stopping by to say hello," Wes grinned, sliding down to the ground next to Vader. "And I was curious to see just who you're cheating on Han with."

Vader was lucky that he didn't have anything in his mouth when Wes said that, otherwise he would've choked. "Excuse me?" he growled once the shock wore off enough for him to speak. The very idea of bedding the Princess was disgusting, she was half his age.

"Don't be absurd Wes," the Princess scowled. "He's twice my age at least."

"Isn't Han?" Wes asked innocently.

"No he's not," she frowned, "he's barely six years older than I am."

Wes winked at her. "Got a thing for older men, eh?"

"Oh grow up!" she snapped, returning her focus to her breakfast.

"Aw," Wes pouted. He immediately brightened up and turned to Vader. "Hey there! Can't say that I've seen you before. What's your name?"

"Leave him alone," she ordered, "let him eat in peace."

"What?" Wes whined. "I'm just trying to engage him in some polite conversation."

"Wedge!" The Princess yelled, appealing to someone else over by the other fires. "Get your little minion out of here!"

"Minion? My dear Princess you insult me! I am not a minion!" Wes sputtered indignantly.

"Would you prefer being called a suicidal maniac?" she asked in a perfectly serious tone.

Wes started to answer, but then he shut his mouth and considered this.

"Come on Wes," another Rebel, who Vader took to be Wedge, sighed.

"Aw, come on Boss!" Wes whined childishly. "I was just—"

"No buts, come on, let's go." Wedge commanded.

"Oh fine," Wes groaned, "always ruining my fun…"

Vader watched the two men warily as they retreated back to their cluster of comrades. Only when the group settled down, did the tense muscles in his shoulders unwind. Satisfied that no more invasions were imminent, he settled back to his breakfast.

But just as he finished eating, his peace was again disturbed. "Starkiller."

It took Vader a moment to recall that that was his new last name. "Yes?" he grumbled and glanced up at the displeased smuggler captain, Han Solo.

The Corellian narrowed his eyes. "If you're going to stay on my ship, you're going to pull your own weight, understand?"

"What would you have me do?" Vader asked curiously.

"Chewie's working on the _Falcon_'s shield generator," Solo grunted and hooked his thumb over his shoulder in the ship's general direction. "Go help him."

Vader considered this task for a moment. "Yes, sir," he agreed before the Corellian could grow more irritated with him and staggered to his feet.

Nodding to the Corellian and the princess, he left them for the aging freighter. Normally, he found being ordered around that way to be insulting and demeaning. However, accepting this task would get him away from most of the Rebels and give him the chance to do something that he enjoyed—working on machines.

_Perhaps I can actually make Solo's heap space-worthy,_ he smirked to himself. _How that ship always managed to outrun my forces I'll never know. When I'm done with it, it will truly be one of the fastest ships in the galaxy…_

* * *

Mara Jade glided through the shadowy corridors of the Imperial Palace towards her Master's chamber. She was still dressed for the Imperial Court and she would've changed if she'd had the time, but any summons was urgent and she would not delay. Her Master understood; he appreciated her devout loyalty and punctuality. Even though she would be appearing before him dressed in the flashy, revealing clothing of an Imperial concubine, he would not mind.

The Emperor made some allowances for his favorite servant. She was his Hand, his personal assassin who he dispatched to quietly clean up the Empire's dangerous dissidents. While Darth Vader had been Emperor Palpatine's right hand, she was his left. She was the subtle knife who stayed in the shadows while Vader had been the big stick with spikes in it. Vader had been for big messes, she was for small, sensitive messes.

She was superior to that traitor, and if she worked hard enough, her Master would see it. With Vader out of the picture, the position of apprentice was now wide open. At the moment, her Master was not seeking to fill the post, but when he did start seriously looking at candidates, she was determined to come out on top. She was already a highly skilled assassin, all she needed was the training in the Force.

Passing between a pair of red-robed Imperial guards, she breezed into the Emperor's private audience chamber and knelt before his throne, her head bowed and eyes cast to the black marble floor. "What is thy bidding, my Master?"

"Rise, my Hand," her Master croaked, and she obeyed. "Come to me," he beckoned with a pale, withered hand, and she moved to stand at the armrest of his black thorny throne. "I must amend your previous orders concerning Luke Skywalker," he announced.

"In what way, my Master?" she asked politely.

Months before, the Emperor had dispatched her to slay Luke Skywalker. She had tracked him to Tatooine and infiltrated Jabba's Palace as the dancing girl Arica. When Skywalker appeared there to rescue his smuggler friend, she had been a hair's breadth away from fulfilling her mandate. However, when Skywalker got himself set up to be executed by Sarlacc, she had not been able to get herself aboard the Hutt's sail barge and so she missed her target.

Normally such failure would result in punishment. But instead of punishing her, the Emperor had set her on a different target—a politician that she had easily slain. After that, she had expected her punishment to come, however the destruction of the second Death Star and the continuing mystery of Lord Vader's whereabouts had probably distracted her Master from that particular task. This amending of her orders concerning Skywalker was the first she'd heard of the mission in a long time.

"Do not worry about killing Skywalker just yet," the Emperor commanded. "Instead, you will seek him out and befriend him. If you feel you can do it without compromising your cover, seduce him. Do not underestimate him," her Master warned, "he possesses forbidden Jedi skills."

"Yes, my Master, it will be done," she promised, baffled at this radical change in plans.

"Once you have insinuated yourself in his life, he will lead you to Lord Vader," her Master continued. "When you have discovered Lord Vader's location and condition, report it to me."

"It will be done, my Master," Mara agreed.

"Because Skywalker has the power of the Force, as we do, I will not be able to watch over you or speak to you. You will be completely your own, beyond any Imperial support in the heart of the criminal Rebellion." Her Master pinned her with a warning stare from under his deep, shadowy hood. "Do not fail me, my Hand."

"I will not fail, my Master," she swore with a bow. "Your will shall be done."

"Good," he purred. "Now go and prepare for your mission."

"Yes, my Master." She bowed and exited the audience chamber.

Her stiletto heels clicked against the black marble floors as she strode through the Palace towards her private quarters. As she walked, she removed various jeweled hairpins from her red-gold hair, destroying the elaborate hairstyle she had worn for the court. As soon as her door closed behind her, she stripped out of her slinky green dress, took off her other jewelry, and pulled on the form-fitting black clothing that she preferred. And then she set about preparing her departure.

Of all her missions, this would be her most difficult. She would have to go deep into enemy territory, befriend and perhaps even seduce the man that she had been previously ordered to kill, and discover the location and condition of the traitorous dog, Darth Vader. And this time, she would have to do so without her Master's guidance, without feeling his presence until she had completed all her objectives. While she was incredibly pleased to be so trusted by her Master that he would grant her such a task, she also feared it.

The Emperor had given her everything. When she had been abandoned on the streets of Coruscant, he had taken her in. He had fed her, clothed her, put a roof over her head, and given her the finest education in everything from culture and politics to weapons and hand-to-hand combat. She lived for his praise and feared his punishment. Making him proud of her was what she lived for. He was the only family that she had ever known and she would die to keep his Empire and its citizens secure.

_I will not fail,_ she swore to herself. _I will get Skywalker eating out of my hand, I will find that slime Lord Vader, and I will win the Sith apprenticeship. I will make my Master proud and I will be a much better Sith than that pathetic creep ever was!_


	9. Rogues and the Elite

**Chapter 9  
**_Rogues and the Elite_

As lunch was being prepared by the Rebel pilots who lost the straw-draw, Vader stretched out on the flattened grass and dozed in the warm sunshine. After over two decades locked in a climate-controlled life support suit, it was an amazing feeling. A gentle breeze stirred across him and he started to smile—

A flash of warning had him rolling out of the way just milliseconds before a smashball smacked the ground where his head had just been.

"Sorry!" one of the Rebel pilots yelled.

Vader shot the small group a deadly glared and hurled the ball back at them as hard as he could. Seeing as the ball barely made it back to the players, he judged himself far from recovered. He'd meant to smack at least one of them in the head with that ball.

_I'm not going to get back to full strength just by doing push-ups and crunches in my little cabin._ He sighed and settled back to the ground, keeping one eye fixed on the Rebels playing ball. _I need to get out of here._

It was a thought he'd had often since waking up a new man. He couldn't trust the Rebels. He was second on their most-wanted list, right after Palpatine. And if he stayed with them too long, the Empire could catch up with him, and that fate looked to be even worse than whatever it was that the Rebellion had planned for him.

He went to run his hand through his hair and found it still barely more than a fuzz of stubble. _I wish this would grow faster,_ he scowled. _I miss my hair._

Shaking his head, he refocused himself on the task of planning. _Where to go, where to go… Somewhere in the Outer Rim probably. Hmm…_ He plucked at the grass around him as he contemplated his options. _Hey, maybe—_

"Hey there!"

Vader looked up to see a panting Rebel – Wes, if his memory served – standing over him, grinning. "Yes?" he asked warily.

"You look lonely," Wes declared. "Want to come play with us?"

"No," Vader frowned. "Thank you," he tacked on as an afterthought. _Must be polite and forgettable._

"Oh come on," Wes whined. "It'll be fun!"

"No, I'm fine," Vader assured him. "Really." _I mean it, just leave me alone._

"Please?" Wes begged, aiming for an innocent, child-like look.

"C'mon, join us!" a second pilot – Tycho, he thought – added. "We need another player anyway."

"I'm sorry, I'm just not up to it," Vader shrugged.

"Have you ever played a game of pick-up smashball before?" a third pilot asked curiously.

"No," Vader answered, "but—"

"Well, there's a first time for everything!" the pilot grinned and grabbed him by the shoulder. "You'll never know if you like the game if you don't give it a try."

A prickle of unease slithered over his skin. "No, I'd rather stay here. Please let go of me."

"Don't be such a wimp," Wes teased with a wicked grin and grabbed Vader's other shoulder. "On your feet! My team needs a full-time goal-keeper."

Every muscle in his body tensed. "I'd rather stay here. Let go of me," he insisted, putting some Force behind his words.

The three Rebels looked a little unfocused for a moment before shrugging off his command. They were veteran fighter pilots, and Rebels; they were not terribly weak-minded. Perhaps he could bend one to his will, but in his vulnerable position with his power split three ways…it just wouldn't work.

"C'mon Hobbie," Wes chuckled and tugged on Vader's arm. "A one, a two—"

"Enough boys!" the Princess interceded before they could haul Vader to his feet. "He's not interested. Drop it."

"Aww!" all three whined in almost perfect unison.

"But he looked so lonely just sitting there!" Wes protested.

"And he was watching us play," Tycho added.

"So we thought we'd invite him to even up the teams," Hobbie finished.

"Are you interested in playing with them?" the Princess asked Vader.

"No," Vader growled. _Even if I wanted to play, I'd get trashed; I'm just not in shape enough._

"Well there you have it. No means no." The Princess made shooing motions with her hands. "Run along back to your game now."

"Can't you talk to her Tycho?" Wes pleaded. "You're both Alderaanian."

Tycho shook his head in defeat. "She's my princess, my sovereign; I don't tell her what to do."

Admitting their failure, the three pilots shuffled back to their smashball game with a lot of sighing and complaining. Vader struggled not to glare at their retreating backs. He was the weak, sissy prisoner here, not the irritated Sith Lord.

"How much longer will we remain on Dantooine?" he asked her before she could walk away.

"A few more days," she replied. "Why? Is there someone you need to be?"

Vader scowled at her little jab. "I don't like it here. They keep trying to touch me!" he hissed, gesturing towards the group of assorted Rebels.

"They keep trying to touch you?" she repeated. "How old are you, five?"

"I don't like being touched," he growled through gritted teeth.

"Well there's not much I can do about that," she shrugged. "It's only for a few more days. Deal with it."

Vader dug his fingers into the flatten stalks of violet grass. "Why you—"

"Be grateful for the fresh air," the Princess interjected. "Be glad that we don't have you locked up in a cage. This is far better than you deserve." She clearly wanted to say more, but she snapped her mouth shut and stalked off instead.

He glared at her retreating form. _What does she know? She's just as deserving of a cell as I am!_

To avoid getting smacked by any future wayward smashballs, Vader abandoned his spot in the sun and took shelter under one of the X-wings. While he missed the warmth of the sunshine, the cool shade wasn't too bad. Propping himself against one of the fighter's landing struts, he let his eyes roam over the motley group of Rebel pilots.

Wes, Tycho, and Hobbie had gone back to playing smashball with great enthusiasm. His son and Wedge, the only two other pilots he knew by name, were by the fires, cooking lunch. The Princess, Solo, and his Wookiee companion were discussing something by a burned out fire near where lunch was being assembled. There were two other Human men playing smashball, along with a male Quarren and a male Sullustan. And there was a Human woman, along with a blue female Mon Calamari and a rough-looking female Saloch, assisting in the lunch preparations.

There would never have been such a fighter squadron in the Empire. But then again, the Empire was male-dominated and Human-centric. No matter how talented any woman or alien was, they would be turned away unless they had powerful, male, Human patrons pulling strings for them.

Vader watched them move around their makeshift campsite with a neutral expression. They were laughing and playing as if they didn't have a care in the galaxy. And yet the ruling power of the galaxy was out to exterminate them. Now that he found himself in trapped in their situation, he found that he couldn't share their cheery optimism.

_Probably because if they knew who I really was, they'd turn on me faster than a lightning viper._ He narrowed his eyes as the blonde woman pilot abruptly left the cooking fires to go check on something inside the cockpit of her fighter. _It's hard to be cheery among enemies with an invisible death mark hovering overhead. I was never the most positive person anyway…_

A ripple of tension swept over the camp. The cooks left their posts by the fires. The smashball game fell apart. Solo, the Wookiee, and the Princess stopped talking and moved in towards the cluster of the Rebels. Intrigued, Vader slipped out of the shadows at the far side of the camp and moved to the fringe of anxious Rebels. They had all clustered around the woman pilot's fighter and were silent as they listened to the comm which was cranked up loud and tuned to a news channel.

_"…response to Lord Vader's treacherous desertion and defection, the Emperor has named seven new special commanders to enforce the will of the Empire and to counter the threat of Rebel terrorists. Spread throughout the Imperial fleet, they will dispense justice and perform all the duties once performed by the disgraced Darth Vader. While it has not been officially confirmed as of yet, it is rumored that these special commanders possess the same supernatural powers as Lord Vader. With men such as these in command of our military, the criminals of the galaxy don't stand a chance. In other news, the economy is—"_

"So what is this?" the Quarren growled as soon as the broadcast was cut off. "Seven Darth Vaders?!"

"Well this is depressing," Hobbie sighed.

"I bet they're all Vader clones," Wes cried.

"Don't say things like that!" Tycho snapped. "It might somehow turn out to be true!"

"That's just a holo-film cliché," Wedge snorted.

"We're doomed if it's really seven Darth Vaders running around out there," the woman pilot muttered as she dropped down from her fighter.

"How did you know there was an important newscast coming on, Feylis?" Luke asked.

"I had my Astromech scanning the news channels," the woman, Feylis, answered with a shrug.

"Clones or not," the Sullustan mused, "this isn't looking good for us."

"You can say that again," one of the Humans grumbled.

Vader struggled not to roll his eyes at the Rebels' bizarre speculations and turned to leave, only to run into the Princess.

"Do you know anything about this?" she demanded quietly, falling into step beside him.

"My best guess is that he's put his 'Dark Side Elite' out in the spotlight to replace me," Vader replied after a moment's consideration.

"And what's so special about them?" she pressed.

"It's a group of seven Dark Jedi, all fanatically loyal to Palpatine," he explained. "They're more powerful than the average Imperial Inquisitor, but none of them are a match for me."

"Anything else?" the Princess asked.

"The leader is a man named Sedriss," he added after combing his memory. "The worst fanatic of the bunch, he loves all the violence he gets to inflict in the Emperor's name. He's a brute, a former mercenary, with no morals to speak of. Avoid running into him if you can, you'll live longer."

"Funny," she snorted. "That sounds a lot like a description of you."

Vader froze mid-stride and glared furiously at her. "I am no fanatic believer in Palpatine, I've wanted to kill him for years. I don't enjoy inflicting violence on others, it simply happens to be the most effective way to get things done properly; sometimes it's the only language that others seem to understand perfectly. I am not a brute, I was never a mercenary, and I do possess morals. And despite several run-ins with me, you're still alive."

"You could've fooled me," she shot back calmly. "Anyway, lunch should be ready shortly." And then she walked away and left him at the far end of camp.

Mentally reciting his vast vocabulary of curses and insults, Vader flopped back down in his previous spot in the shade. With every conversation he shared with her, he came closer and closer to exploding on her. She was stubborn, irritating, bold, and at times incredibly disconcerting.

_I really need to get out of here before I kill someone…seeing as there's no where to run when all the other Rebels find the corpse and come gunning after me._

* * *

Admiral Piett stood stiffly at attention on the bridge as the mighty _Executor_ sailed away from the glittering jewel of Coruscant (technically it was "Imperial Center" but only the Emperor and those trying to win favor from him ever called it that) out towards deep space. The atmosphere on the bridge was tenser than it had been in a long time. It reminded the admiral of the days when Lord Vader ruled the ship, only now it was worse.

After the terrible accident with Darth Vader's modified TIE fighter, Piett had feared that the Emperor would punish him for failing to assist the Dark Lord speedily enough. However, once Piett had delivered his report to Emperor Palpatine, no action had been taken. Aside from keeping their eyes out for Lord Vader's lost fighter, the _Executor,_ along with the rest of the Imperial fleet, was ordered to continue with the previous missions and patrols as assigned.

For months the _Executor_ had gone on without Darth Vader. Those months had been the smoothest Piett could ever recall, and those months had seen the lowest number of crew fatalities. But a mere two weeks ago, the mighty Super Star Destroyer had been recalled at the direct order of the Emperor.

Apparently Emperor Palpatine felt that it was time to have a visible extension of his will in command of the awesome vessel. With Lord Vader gone, officially a traitor although Piett was rather certain that he was dead, the Emperor had introduced a new set of enforcers. Instead of one man, he'd opted to deploy seven: the Dark Side Elite.

The Emperor had assigned two of his new representatives to the _Executor_ and spread the other five throughout the fleet. The senior member of the pair was a rough-looking mercenary sort of individual known only as Sedriss. The other was a grim, distant young man named Kam Solusar. Both were clearly dangerous men and were said to have powers similar to that of the absent Lord Vader, and they carried the Dark Lord's signature weapon.

At the moment, both were present on the bridge, which accounted for the incredible sense of tension.

"What is our ETA for light-speed?" Sedriss hissed, making several younger officers flinch.

"Ten minutes, sir," the navigator replied.

The black cloaked figure made no response to indicate that he had heard, though he didn't ask again. From the corner of his eye, Piett could see the navigator, a seasoned officer who had survived Lord Vader, sweating profusely. Several other officers around him looked just as anxious.

That was the problem with the new overlords. The crew was used to Lord Vader; they knew what would and wouldn't get them killed. With new men in charge, it was now a mystery as to what would set one or both of them off.

Until the crew had adjusted to its new masters, the interior of the _Executor_ would be rife with fear. Everyone was jumping at shadows, looking over their shoulders, and flinching at any unexpected sound. Even the droids seemed wary as they performed their programmed functions.

_Hopefully these two will be as competent and effective as Lord Vader was,_ Piett prayed. _And hopefully they don't kill too many crewmen before they get settled in…_

* * *

As night fell over Dantooine, Luke took the opportunity to slip away from the camp. He hiked through the tall purplish grass away from the circle of X-wings and the parked _Millennium Falcon_ until he couldn't hear his friends joking and laughing. Satisfied at the distance, he settled down into meditation.

He wasn't alone for long.

"What's troubling you, young Luke?"

He opened his eyes, but the bluish specter of Obi-Wan "Ben" Kenobi was nowhere to be seen.

"A lot of things," Luke sighed. "Mostly my father. I thought he'd be at least a little appreciative about what we've done for him."

"Perhaps he would be if he had asked for the help," Ben replied. "He's been removed from a position he's held for over two decades and understood, he's been stripped of most of the power that he's accustomed to, and placed among a group of people that have long been his enemies. While his health has been restored, he is still weak and off-balance; he is very much like a cornered wild animal and he will continue to lash out until he readjusts and re-centers himself."

Luke slumped his shoulders. "I don't suppose you could talk to him?"

"I've tried," Ben answered. "But he believes that I am nothing more than a dream and my presence upsets him."

"What do you suggest I do?" Luke asked wearily.

"Be patient and be careful," Ben's disembodied voice advised. "I doubt that he'll become violent without strong provocation, but he is still convinced that the Dark Side is the aspect of the Force that he should follow and he will tempt you to join him."

Luke hesitated before asking the question that had been bothering him the most lately. "Do you think he'd return to the Emperor if he could?"

"At this moment, no, he won't. He's cut his last ties to Palpatine and now that he is medically independent there is nothing to pull him back to the Emperor's side as of yet." Ben sighed. "However, there is very little holding him to the Alliance; just the fact that he is now a fugitive from the Empire, and you. It is likely, I think, that he will leave the Alliance and strike out on his own for a time. Where he will go and what he will do if he does this, I can't say."

"Father might leave?" Luke sputtered in shock.

"I think it's a strong possibility at this time, Luke," Ben replied. "But remember, the future is always in motion. He may end up staying."

Luke ran his fingers over his mechanical prosthetic. "Ben, do you think it would be better if father were to leave the Alliance?"

Ben didn't immediately answer and Luke began to wonder if his deceased mentor's spirit had left him. "It may be better for him if he left," the ghost said at last. "He feels surrounded by enemies, unsafe; he's under a great deal of stress and it prevents him from thinking beyond how he's thought as Darth Vader. Spending some time on his own could help him get his thoughts in order and decided what he wants to do with this chance he has been given."

"I see," Luke nodded after a moment.

"You have another question," Ben observed after a stretch of silence.

"Do you think he can be saved, Ben?" Luke asked quietly. "Do you think he can come back?"

"I really don't know, Luke," Ben sighed sadly. "I hope so. But I wouldn't get my hopes up too high. The things he did in the early days of the Purges…the Anakin Skywalker that I knew would never do those things."

Feeling his heart sink, Luke stood up. "Thanks for talking with me, Ben."

"You're welcome, Luke," Ben answered. "Have a good night."

Luke bowed awkwardly to the empty air and hiked back towards the camp. He would've liked more support from his first teacher, but he understood Ben's hesitance to get his hopes up. His father had betrayed Ben badly, and Luke imagined that it would hard for even a great Jedi like Ben to forgive the man once known as Anakin Skywalker.

When he reentered the circle of X-wings, Luke found his sister waiting for him with her arms folded over her chest. "Where were you?"

"Out," Luke shrugged, eager to get his hands on the last of dinner.

"Doing what?" she inquired.

"Talking to dead people," he answered.

She shifted uneasily. "Isn't it a little strange?"

"What is a little strange?" Luke blinked, confused.

"Talking to someone you saw die as if they were still alive," she explained. "And having them talk back to you. Normally when that happens to a person, it's a sign of insanity."

Luke shrugged. "I never really thought about it. I needed his guidance, and he was there."

"I wish that my father—" She stopped short and began again. "I wish that-that Bail could talk to me that way."

"I don't know if he can," Luke shrugged awkwardly. "I'm sure that Ben wouldn't mind giving you some advice if you asked."

She gave him a skeptical look. "You think so?"

"Well, he's dead. I don't think he's got anything better to do with his time." Luke ran a hand through his messy hair. "Is there any food left?"

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, there's still plenty of food left. Come on."

Luke grinned and followed his sister towards the campfires. "Great."

"Men," she muttered just loud enough for him to hear. "Always thinking with their stomachs."

Luke only laughed in response.


	10. Explosion

**Chapter 10  
**_Explosion_

Han Solo was not a particularly well-educated man. Most of his education came from the streets, cantinas, con artists, and other smugglers. The only formal education he knew of was an unhappy stint in one of the Imperial Academies – an attempt of his at the straight-and-narrow life – that led to a shorter stint in the Imperial navy which ended with his rescue of his pal Chewie. However, this lack of book-learning did not by any means make him stupid.

He knew that something was up. A lot of somethings. There were a lot of secrets floating around him, secrets that he wasn't privy to, and it made him very, very unhappy.

Most of the mystery revolved around this Anakin Starkiller character. Leia said that he was a former Imperial—something that immediately gave the man a black mark in Han's book. But the fact that Leia wouldn't tell him anything else made Han very suspicious. The rumors floating around didn't help any.

With Darth Vader's disappearance months ago, all sorts of theories cropped up as to why and where he was. Some said that he had gone rogue. Some said he'd gone crazy and been banished to an empty wasteland planet. Others claimed that he'd defected to the Alliance for varying reasons. And some said that he'd up and died from health problems.

No one believed that he was dead. Vader was just too mean, too evil, to just die. And the rumor of his defection—no member of the Alliance believed, but the Emperor strangely seemed to; the price on Vader's head was proof of that. The stories that he'd gone rogue or crazy were the most believable. But what if…

…What if the Emperor's bounty on Vader's head for treason wasn't just the action of a senile, paranoid mind? What if that story that nasty old Palpatine believed was true? What if the Alliance really had made a deal with the devil? And what if this Anakin Starkiller was the missing Dark Lord himself?

There was more evidence to say that Starkiller _was_ the Dark Lord than there was saying that he _wasn't_—at least from what Han had seen. The man was secretive, cranky, and glared at everything. The creep only seemed to hold respect for the Princess (because she was high-class) and the Kid (because he was a Jedi), and that respect was very limited. He clearly didn't think all that much of Han or anyone else in the Alliance camp. He held himself apart, he refused to play sabacc or smashball or any game, he didn't help cook, he didn't do anything other than sit off to the side and watch them like he was above them all.

The only helpful thing he'd done was assist Chewie in some repairs on the _Falcon_, and even then he'd been troublesome. Chewie had found him competent enough, but Starkiller had a tendency to jump ahead and work on other things—things that the Wookiee hadn't given him permission to tinker with. Eventually the Wookiee had grown so irritated with his meddling that Starkiller had been thrown out. His first mate's complaints were more than enough reason for Han to not put Starkiller on repair duty ever again. Who knew what the man was up to? He could be purposely sabotaging the ship to get back to his Imp buddies.

Han pulled his blaster out of its holster and started cleaning it. The longer that Starkiller was on his ship, the more he wanted to put a shot right between his eyes. His gut told him that the man was trouble, and he trusted his gut a lot. It had saved him more times than he could count.

Her Worshipfulness didn't like Starkiller any more than he did—he could tell. She avoided him whenever possible, and when she had to interact with him, she kept it as brief as possible. The air crackled with tension when they were together, and she was on edge for hours before and after she dealt with him.

It all just screamed Vader to him. Leia didn't like him, Han's gut didn't like him, and he didn't like anyone. The mystery and air of superiority surrounding him seemed to fit in with the Dark Lord's presence. And the "confidential" rating stamped on him by the Alliance High Council was the icing on the cake.

With his blaster cleaned, he jammed it back into the holster and scanned through the read-outs on the _Falcon's _bridge. They'd left Dantooine behind hours ago after several days of welcomed relaxation. But provisions had run low and the X-wings needed to refuel and so their party had broken up. It would be weeks until they could meet up again.

It was hard to imagine Starkiller as the man inside the fearsome black armor, though. He was at least a few inches shorter than Vader, he was young, and rather handsome. However, if the rumors were true, if Vader had really needed that suit to survive, the medical attention that Starkiller had required would fit.

He narrowed his eyes as he stared out at the washed-out mess of hyperspace outside the viewscreen. _If Starkiller is Vader, then I'd like to know whose idea it was to fix him up and make him a little pretty boy so I can deck him! Hutt spit, Starkiller better not be Vader…_

If he was, he could understand why she wouldn't tell him. Vader had tortured him in Cloud City, slammed him in a block of carbonite, sold him to Jabba, and twisted poor Lando's arm to do it all. There wasn't much more he would like than to blast Darth Vader into oblivion. She knew that and that's why she wouldn't tell him. And he greatly resented the fact that she thought he couldn't handle knowing.

_I can handle it,_ he thought darkly. _I wouldn't kill him, I'd just get him off my ship. Some other delusional Rebel can baby-sit him. I ain't gonna sit around and wait for him to stab me in my sleep, that's all!_

"(What's on your mind, cub?)" Chewie grunted beside him.

"Just thinking of ways to get rid of Starkiller without the Princess noticing," Han grumbled.

"(When you joined the Alliance, you made a promise to follow their orders,)" Chewie reminded him.

Han briefly cursed the Wookiee's strong sense of honor. "I know, I know," he growled. "But I don't like him and I will be much happier when he finally gets off for good."

"(As will I,)" Chewie agreed. "(You and the Princess are far too tense with him around.)"

"What is your opinion of him, exactly?" Han asked.

"(I am not entirely sure what to make of him,)" Chewie admitted. "(He was disobedient and sure that he knows best when he worked on the ship. In general, he is not a very pleasant Human to share space with. However…)" The Wookiee paused to thoughtfully groom some tangled fur with his climbing claws. "(There is something vaguely familiar about him—his appearance, his smell. I feel that I should know him from somewhere; however, I can figure out where I might know him from.)"

Han perked up. "You _think_ you know him? Where the hell would you have met Starkiller before?"

"(The name Anakin Starkiller means nothing to me,)" Chewie replied. "(If I have met him before, it was under another name.)"

"Wonderful," Han muttered darkly.

"(Rest easy, cub,)" Chewie advised. "(This Starkiller has not seriously misbehaved as of yet, and I will keep my eye on him. When the fleet reassembles, he will be out of our fur.)"

"That's what her Worship is always saying," Han complained. "The damned rendezvous can't come soon enough."

"No, it can't," Leia sighed, trudging onto the cramped bridge with a cup of caf.

Han glowered at her, but held his tongue. _I don't want to fight with her about him,_ he reminded himself.

"Please don't look at me like that," Leia muttered, slumping into the navigator's seat. "I drew the short straw when it came time to pick him up; I don't want him around any more than you do."

"Sure," he grunted.

She pinched the bridge of her nose. "Han…just don't. I have a headache and talking _him_ into his room didn't help."

"Why is it that he only talks to you and the Kid?" Han grumbled.

Her shoulders tensed. "He's just picky, I suppose." She downed a large gulp of her drink. "I really wish he'd find someone else to bother."

"Like who, your brother?" he snorted.

"If I could fly a fighter half as good as he can, we would've switched places on Dantooine," she replied.

"And leave me behind?" he sputtered.

"Well you don't let anyone else fly this heap," she shot back. "And it's not like we can stuff him into the cargo compartment of an X-wing."

"Why not?" he joked. "I bet he'd enjoy it."

She glared at him over the rim of her cup. "Don't tempt me."

"Why not?" he repeated with a grin. "It'll be fun."

"Unfortunately we're not going to the same port as the Rogues are," she muttered. "No X-wings are available."

"Damn," Han sighed. "There goes my fun."

Leia only rolled her eyes and drank her caf in response.

Han leaned back into his chair and laced his fingers over his stomach. "So, how is our grumpy, unwanted guest?"

"I don't want to talk about it," she snapped.

He raised a questioning eyebrow. "That bad, huh?"

She shook her head. "You have no idea."

"What did—"

"You don't want to know," she muttered.

He frowned. "What if I do want to know?"

"Han, you don't," she insisted. "Let's not talk about him anymore, all right?"

"What are we going to talk about, then?" he asked.

Leia drained the last of her caf and set the empty cup aside. "How about we don't talk?"

He blinked. "Don't talk? How else are we going to pass the—"

She got out of her seat and pressed a finger to his lips to silence him. "There are other ways to pass the time, flyboy." A curious spark darted through her deep brown eyes. "Interested?"

_Is she saying what I think she's saying?_ She picked up her empty cup and sauntered a way, shooting an intriguing glance over her shoulder as she exited the bridge. _I think she is. And I think she's serious!_

"Hey, Chewie, watch the bridge for me," he muttered as he peeled himself out of his seat. "I'll be back in a few hours."

"(See that you two make it into your cabin, cub,)" Chewie sniffed.

"Yes, dad," Han groaned as he slipped after Leia.

Han Solo was not a mushy, lovey-dovey, romantic kind of guy. He'd been all over the galaxy and met all kinds of people and done all kinds of things. And yet this tiny little princess of a dead planet with a sharp tongue and fiery temper had him chasing after her like a tame house pet.

In the past, this would've bothered him a great deal. At the moment, it didn't bother him one bit. And for the next few hours, it was enough to make him forget that he was potentially sharing his beloved ship with a mass murderer who had tortured his girlfriend and locked him in a block of carbonite for Jabba…

* * *

_The world was one of shadow and flame. The air was hot, stifling, and foul. All around was twisted black rock, lit by the eerie hot glow of rivers of lava. For a moment, he thought he was in hell. But then he realized that he was somewhere much worse: Mustafar._

_Abruptly, he was on the landing pad of the droid foundry, his hand raised to crush her throat, to stem the tide of lies—they had to be lies! She'd betrayed him! She—the angel he'd sold his soul for, bloodied his hands for, dove into the Darkness for! She'd brought his greatest foe to kill him! And—_

_Then he was in a white, sterile cell—stained red by the lenses of his mask. The sound of his respirator hissed maddeningly in his ears. She was stretched out on the metal cot and stiffened up as the black sphere of the hovering interrogation droid, loaded with truth serum, floated into the cell after him. He held her in place as the syringe plunged into her arm and as the drugs took effect he plunged into her mind, determined to tear the information out by whatever force necessary. She cried out—_

_Luke screamed as his sword hand was severed just below the wrist, his hand and weapon sailing away into the depths of the shaft in Cloud City. The young man, so much like he was once, drenched in sweat and clothed in tan Rebel fatigues, hunched over, cradling the stump of his right arm. He recoiled away from the outstretched hand, clung to the cluster of pipes and sensors that hung out into space, cried out horrified denials as the truth was made known to him. Luke looked down at the bottomless shaft, glanced once more at the offered hand, and then let go, to fall down and down and down—_

_She lay spent on the medical table, tears streaming down her face. Obi-Wan stood beside her, cradling a newborn baby, pleading with her to hold on. She did not seem to hear him, whispering tearful, wearily, how she believed that her Anakin still existed, that there was still some good in him. Then she faded away. Her eyes closed, her body went limp, the baby started to scream as he sensed his mother's death, his cry echoing in the chamber—_

_A little girl, dressed for bed with her braid hair up in braids and a plush Nerf tucked under her arm, sat on a curving staircase listening. Below and oblivious to her, two men – Viceroy Organa and another Alderaanian politician – were in the midst of a heated argument. The other Alderaanian thought that some other distant relation of Organa's should be named the heir to the throne of Alderaan because the current princess was adopted and therefore unworthy. Organa harshly disputed this idea, claiming that his daughter – adopted she may be – was more than worthy to be Princess of Alderaan—he knew her lineage and found her to be qualified. And the little girl listened wide-eyed, tearing up, because she hadn't known—_

_A little boy, with blonde hair and dusty beige clothes, peered out of his garage in shock as his uncle brandished a long-barreled laser rifle at a cloaked and hooded figure. The cloaked figure, kindly old Ben Kenobi who had always smiled at the boy and slipped him a piece of candy whenever they had met in Anchorhead, tried to reason with the moisture farmer, but to no avail. The gruff uncle snarled at old Ben, demanding that he go away and never come near the boy again lest he turn out like his father, and if he ever did come back he would be shot. Old Ben seemed to shrink in defeat and slunk away, more sad than he usually was – the boy had always felt that Ben was a very sad man, even when he smiled – and the little boy crept back into the garage wondering why it would be so bad to be like his father—_

_She lay still and cold in a floating, open-topped casket. Her chocolate curls were loose and framed her pale face like a dark halo. The carved Japor snippet – the symbol of their love – was entwined in her folded hands—hands that rested against her belly swollen with a dead child. Dusted over with tiny lavender blossoms, she was drawn through the mourning streets of Theed towards the same temple where Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn had been cremated. And both Naboo and Gungan wept for her, ignorant of the man who had loved her, had suffered for her, had killed for her, had killed her—_

_Obi-Wan stood above him on the rocky black shore—his expression one of pure agony, even though he wasn't hurt. His fallen opponent, horribly maimed, clawed towards him, eyes bleeding demonic yellow as he hated with every fiber of his being. The Jedi cried out his pain, his love for the fallen. And the fallen only hurled back venomous hate. Obi-Wan took the dropped lightsaber, turned, and walked away. And then he was burning, burning, burning—_

* * *

Vader tumbled off his narrow ship-board bed, tangled in his thin sheets, and drenched in sweat. He hit the deck still not fully and beat at the dream-flames that consumed him. For a few minutes, he was still stuck in the nightmare, still stuck in the memory—he could feel the heat of the flames, he could smell his flesh and hair burning, he could hear the crackle of the flames and his own body cooking. And then it was over and he was laying on the cold metal floor in the pitch black cabin aboard the _Millennium Falcon._

Trembling, he fought to catch his breath and escape his tangled sheet. Once he regained a seat on the edge of his bed, he buried his face in his hands and struggled to sort out what he'd seen. The scenes, images, and feelings had blended seamlessly together, even though almost half of what he'd experienced had never happened to him.

Uncomfortable in the tiny, dark cabin, he got up and staggered out into the main cabin, slapping on the lights so he wasn't in the dark anymore. Leaning against the dejarik table, he tried to determine why he'd dreamed the other things. Luke's memories he could understand; the boy was his son and they shared a familial bond. But the Princess's memories—they had no place in his head.

_It must be the close proximity,_ he decided at last. _She's only a few rooms away from me, on the same ship. Being an untrained Force-adept, of course her mind bled a bit into mine…_

With that mystery solved, he was left haunted by the content of the dream.

Mustafar. It was a place he loathed even more than Tatooine. And then recalling when his Angel had gone there, plunged herself into that hell to see him, and what he had done to her—

She'd left him no choice! To think that she would betray him that way after all he'd done for her was still sickening. His Angel had brought Kenobi along, knowing full well what the Jedi would do when they met. He'd been so tired of the lies, so disgusted that _she_ would lie to him, that he just had to make it stop.

Then he'd seen her die. He'd seen the conclusion to his old nightmare in greater clarity than he'd ever seen it before. Anger burned in his gut that Kenobi had been there with her and not him, that Kenobi had held his newborn son and not him. He hadn't been there because Kenobi had cut him down and left him to die!

Her funeral. He hadn't been able to attend. Perhaps it was best that he hadn't. It would've ruined his image as a fearsome Sith. But he had seen recordings of it; indelible proof that she was indeed dead, as Palpatine had claimed.

The conclusion to his duel on Mustafar was a cruel end-cap to the nightmare. It had been part of thousands of his nightmares. It was old news. But it still hurt. It hurt a lot more than it should, and not because it was him burning alive. Kenobi had rejected him; turned and walked away without hesitation or a backwards glance, even as he heard the screams of fiery agony. And to think he'd just professed love for the burning, to think that Qui-Gon – dream though he was – had confirmed that declaration.

Twisting his thoughts forcibly away from that memory, he settled on what he'd seen from Luke. The scene from Bespin had been one that they'd shared. It was not an event he particularly cared to remember. He hadn't meant to take the boy's hand off, but Luke had landed a blow on his upper arm, one of the few parts of him that had still been flesh and blood, and he had reacted. At least that damage was easily repairable. In some ways, prosthetic limbs were better than the original. And it had been only one hand; no great loss. The suicidal leap on Luke's part—now that was the part that really bothered him.

_He has accepted the truth now,_ he consoled himself. _That rejection means nothing now._

The other memory of Luke's – for he was certain that's what it was – was thoroughly interesting. It seemed that his step-brother had done at least one good thing for Luke. He drove Kenobi and his Jedi lies far away from the boy at an early age. That was very good. However, the feelings from Luke's mind – the bit about how Kenobi had always smiled and given him candy, how the boy felt that Kenobi was always sad – left him uncomfortable. That Luke had the sense that Kenobi was always sad, even when he smiled, mirrored his observations from the recent dreams of the Jedi Temple. Kenobi had looked young, but his eyes had been old and sad, untouched by whatever expression danced over his face.

Shaking his head sharply, he moved on to what he'd seen from the Princess—

The Princess, dressed in a large loose shirt and sleep shorts, trudged through the main cabin utterly oblivious to his presence in it. She was pale, damp with sweat, and rubbing her right arm as if it pained her. Vader frowned as he suddenly realized that that spot on her arm was where the truth serum had been injected on the Death Star several years before.

_Did she suffer a similar dream?_ he wondered as he watched her. She slipped into the galley for a few minutes and came out with a steaming mug of something. Leaning against a nearby bulkhead, she sipped at it, still ignorant of his presence or his watching eyes.

"Credit for your thoughts?" he asked quietly.

The Princess jumped so badly that she spilled half of whatever hot liquid was in her mug all over the floor. Her dark eyes landed on him and widened in a mixture of lingering terror and absolute fury. She clutched at her mug, heedless of the hot fluid burning her fingers, and worked her jaw for a moment before she pulled herself together enough to speak.

"Get back in your room!" she growled, trembling.

He smirked at her, pleased that he finally had her nervous. "No."

"You are the last person I want to see right now," she snapped. "Get out of my sight!"

"I never knew that nightmares bothered you so much, Princess," he sneered.

"How did you—?" Her mouth snapped shut and she stared at him. Obviously the idea that he'd seen part of her nightmare was profoundly disturbing to her. Then she regained her wits and narrowed her eyes at him. "So, you saw that too." She stalked over to him and slammed her nearly empty mug down on the dejarik table. "Tell me something. Did you ever really love her?"

His blood froze in his veins before exploding into fire. "What?" he hissed, deadly calm.

"Did you ever really love her?" she asked again in the same tone as he had spoken. "Or was she just a possession? A beautiful bird to be locked in a gilded cage to sing for you and for you alone? And when she sang a song that you couldn't bear to hear, you snapped her neck and threw her away?"

There was a terrible roaring in his ears, like the howl of a dragon, and his hands curled into fists.

"Did she ever mean anything to you?" the Princess continued, blind to or simply uncaring of his growing wrath. "It certainly didn't look like it to me. She loved you with everything she had, and you choked her, called her a liar! Is that what happens to everyone who loves you? You kill them?! Is that what will happen to Luke? He'll say the wrong thing to you one day and they you'll reach out and—"

His hands were wrapped around her pale throat and he had her slammed against the fall wall in the blink of an eye. He didn't recall moving, but he must have. She was clawing at his arms, desperate to get air, but he didn't feel her nails, even as they left bloody marks on his bare forearms. He just kept squeezing, stopping the foul accusations that spilled from her lips.

How dare she say such things to him? How dare she insult his wife? How dare she insult _him_? How dare she?!

She tried to kick him, but he had her thoroughly pinned. She tried to bit him, but he was clutching her neck too tightly. She kept on scratching him, but as her air ran out her strength began to wane.

_"Let her go, Anakin!"_ The voice roared from everywhere and nowhere—a command that hit him like a bucket of ice water. _"Let her go!"_

For the briefest second, he wasn't sure where or when he was. He was on the _Millennium Falcon_—he was on Mustafar. He was throttling the Princess with his bare hands—he was using the Force to crush his Angel's windpipe. He was so very angry and Obi-Wan was yelling at him to stop…and he obeyed.

He dropped her and she crumpled bonelessly to the floor, unconscious. He stood there for a long time, his hands trembling uncontrollably, though he wasn't sure why. After an eternity he managed to unfreeze and check her vitals. Assured that she would be fine, he left her there and retreated to his cabin, haunted by her staring eyes. Padmé had looked at him with love, even as he choked her. The Princess has stared at him with the same color eyes, with nothing but hatred and disgust, even as the life started to fade from her. The parallels were jarring, the differences even more so.

_The next time this ship lands, I'm getting off and I'm never coming back…_

* * *

Spots swam before her eyes as she clawed her way back to consciousness. The floor was cold and hard beneath her. Every breath hurt as she sucked it through her raw, bruised throat. She hurt all over and just wanted the pain to go away.

_Bastard,_ she thought darkly. _It was stupid to provoke him that way, but… That bastard! He killed her!_

It had been a secret fear of hers ever since Luke had informed her of her true father. She had feared that the kind but sad woman of her dreams, the woman that she had always regarded as her mother, had died at his hands. And now, after that disturbing montage nightmare, she knew that it was true.

She allowed a few tears to slip from her eyes. Her poor, poor mother; she'd loved a man so completely, in spite of the fact that he was so undeserving, and it had cost her everything. Now she understood why the beautiful kind woman of her dreams was so very sad.

Rubbing at her eyes, Leia propped herself up against the bulkhead and concentrated on breathing. She was really regretting provoking him now. Not only did her throat hurt, but she was going to have some spectacular bruises in the morning, and she had no idea how she was going to explain it to Han.

"That was a very foolish thing for you to do," the voice of an elderly man scolded.

"Who?" she croaked, her eyes darting around in search of the speaker.

The blue-tinted transparent image of an elderly gentleman materialized before her. She'd seen him once before, a brief glimpse, mere moments before he was sliced in two by Darth Vader's crimson blade. Luke had described the spirit's visits before, but it was completely surreal that he had come to her now.

"Do you know who I am?" he asked gently.

"Yes," she rasped hoarsely. "General Kenobi."

"I haven't been a general in a long time," he chuckled sadly. His ghostly image knelt down in front of her, his expression grave. "You are a very fortunate woman, Princess."

Leia nodded mutely.

The Jedi ghost gave her a stern look. "I trust that you will not incite his wrath again anytime soon?"

She shook her head bitterly.

"I know it will be difficult," he continued gently, "but I am no longer tangible and the help that I can give you is limited."

"I understand," she croaked.

"Good," he nodded in satisfaction. "Now let me see your neck."

She obligingly tilted her head back so that the ghost could examine her injuries. A shiver danced along her spine as she felt cool puffs of air – ghostly fingertips – drifting over her skin. It only added to the dream-like quality of the encounter.

"It will bruise," he said at last, "but I should be able to help you heal it enough to reduce the marks."

Leia nodded and listened attentively to whatever instructions he had for her—anything to avoid Han flipping out.

It took hours and she was left with the distinct impression that if she had half of Luke's training it would've been much quicker. However, she managed to go through all the steps General Kenobi had described, and when she was done her throat felt immensely better. When she opened her eyes after finishing, he was gone.

Sighing, she set about cleaning up the spilled tea and used mug before crawling back into Han's room. She was glad that her nightmare hadn't woken him up and doubly glad that the thick walls of the _Falcon_ had prevented him from hearing the commotion she'd set into motion. Curling up into his sleepy embrace, she closed her eyes and desperately dreaded the coming day and the possibility of seeing _him_ ever again…

* * *

Luke started awake in the cockpit of his X-wing in the midst of hyperspace, reeling from the nightmare. The images and feelings the lingered made him shudder in horror. He knew, without a shred of doubt, that all of what he'd seen had really happened. And he had a strong feeling that his sister and father had had similar dreams.

He longed to be with his sister and father to diffuse the tensions that he knew would flare up and ask them questions that only they could answer. But they were on the _Millennium Falcon_, light-years away, and he was stuck in the cockpit of his fighter. He couldn't even call them on the comm.

Powerless to help, Luke closed his eyes and worked on meditating his way back to sleep. As much as he wanted to do something, he simply couldn't. All he could do was trust in the Force that everything would work out for the best and wait. He didn't like it, but he had no choice.

_I hope that neither of them do anything foolish…_


	11. Thin Air

**Chapter 11**  
_Thin Air_

Leia hid away in Han's cabin as long as she could. When Han got up, she feigned sleep until he was gone. And she kept up the pretense of sleeping in until she simply couldn't stand it anymore. After washing up and applying a little makeup to her neck to hide the faint bruises, she ignored her hunger and headed for the bridge where Han and Chewie would be.

"What's our status?" she asked, struggling to keep her voice unaffected by her sore throat.

"Sleeping beauty awakes!" Han cried. "It's a miracle!"

She pinched his arm. "Knock it off, Han."

"Ow!" he whined. "That hurt!"

"Don't be such a baby!" she groaned. "That didn't hurt. Now answer the question!"

"Relax your Worship!" Han grunted. "We're coming up on Taris and we should be getting landing clearance within the hour."

"How long are you planning on staying?" Leia asked.

"Just long enough to refuel and restock supplies," he shrugged. "One, two days tops."

Leia ran some quick calculations in her head. "That leaves us with just under three weeks to kill until the rendezvous."

"We'll have to stop at least one more time before then for fuel," Han added. "Maybe more than that if you have something in mind for us to be doing, other than drifting on the stellar winds and keeping our heads down."

"No, no plans," she muttered. _Two weeks, give or take a day…that's too long. Maybe we should just head to the ground base on Arbra and leave him there._

That was a good course of action. However, it directly conflicted with "the plan" cooked up for dealing with Vader. The idea had been to bring him to the fleet and have him judged there by the High Council. He was not to be brought to Arbra on the off-chance that the Empire was somehow able to track him there. Haven Base on Arbra had to remain secure; the Alliance would not leave the native Hoojibs undefended unless there was absolutely no other choice. The peaceful, telepathic rodents wouldn't last long under Imperial domination.

Gnawing at her lower lip, she seated herself in the navigator's chair. As much as she wanted to ditch Vader or Arbra, or hand him off to someone else, she couldn't. She and Han and Chewie could barely manage him as it was; if they washed their hands of him, he could manipulate or murder his way out of Alliance custody. And she had promised Mon Mothma that she would personally take charge of him until the rendezvous with the fleet.

_There's just no getting out of it,_ she sighed. _We're stuck with him until further notice… But that doesn't mean that I have to waste all my time thinking about him._

With that resolution in mind, Leia fixed her attention on what Han and Chewie were doing. As Han had said, they soon gained permission to land on Taris. The _Falcon_ breached the atmosphere without incident and made it to a landing pad without falling out of the sky. It was all going very smoothly.

Then Leia applied herself to helping Han acquire supplies while Chewie oversaw the refueling. That too went very smoothly. It was a refreshing change from how things had been going for them recently.

She was put in such a good mood, she almost agreed to go out with Han and Chewie to some cantina they'd heard of. However, after avoiding Vader all day, she knew she had to check on him before going out. Who knew what mischief he might be scheming to unless when they all went out? Whatever it was, she doubted that Threepio could prevent it. Hopefully she could get a feel for what was on his mind and dispel it…without getting her trachea crushed this time.

Gathering up her nerve, she marched up to his door and gave it a firm knock. "Hello?"

Silence.

"Don't tell me that you're asleep. I won't believe it!"

Still silence.

"I'm coming in and you'd better be decent!"

Leia keyed open the door to find…a deserted cabin.

Her blood turned to ice.

She checked all the cabins, the galley, the engineering compartment, the bridge, and the cargo bay. She had Han and Chewie go through every nook and cranny in the _Falcon_ where a Human of Vader's size could possibly fit. And all they found was Threepio. The protocol droid had been manually deactivated, and when switched back on, could give them no information on who had turned him off or where their top-secret passenger was.

At her wit's end, and well into a deep despair, she joined Han and Chewie on a futile hunt for the escaped Sith Lord. She had no real hope of finding him. Without his trademark black armor and noisy respirator, there was nothing distinctive that set him apart from the diverse crowd. And worse, night was fast falling.

_And things had been going so smoothly…I should have known better._

* * *

Vader indulged in a few minutes of quiet celebration before refocusing his mind on the business at hand. Now that he was free from Rebel custody, he needed to get far away from them to avoid recapture. And he had to avoid planets heavily occupied by the Empire. It would be a piece of cake.

Escaping the _Millennium Falcon_ had been child's play. The Princess appeared to be very reluctant to come near him again—which was not only fine with him, but gave him a great advantage. When she and Solo left the ship to acquire various supplies, he shut Threepio down and slipped past the Wookiee when he was distracted and yowling at one of the refueling droids.

It was all so simple…and so pathetic.

The Princess hadn't even bothered to lock his door—not that it would've done anything to stop him. She was a fool and had grown complacent as evidenced by their altercation the previous night. And now she was going to pay for her mistakes as he reveled in his freedom.

For the first time in his life, he answered to no one but himself. First it had been Gardulla that had held his leash, then Watto, then Obi-Wan and the Jedi, then Darth Sidious, and finally his Rebel captors. After over forty years, he was finally free.

His first stop was a public fountain to gather spare change and then an information kiosk. If he had to guess what planet he was on, judging by the heavy urbanization, he suspected that it was one of the ecumenopolis worlds—planets that had been completely covered by city. There was no way that it was Coruscant – the Princess and her smuggler companion weren't _that_ stupid – or any of the other Core World ecumenopolii, but it was more likely one of the more distant worlds—perhaps Axxila. In consulting the kiosk, he discovered that he was on Taris.

_Ah, the "Coruscant of the Outer Rim,"_ he smirked. _Or, at least it used to be._

In the distant past, Taris had been a major shipping hub for its section of the Outer Rim. So much commerce had funneled through it that in barely more than a century the mostly green planet had been transformed into a reflection of Coruscant. However, centuries after that high point, new shipping lanes had been opened up and trade shifted away, beginning a slow slide into decay. The final straw for Taris was during one of the Sith wars—during the time of Darth Revan and Darth Malak, Vader thought. One of the Sith Lords had had his fleet of battleships bombard the planet from orbit, almost completely ruining it. Taris had been mostly rebuilt since then, but the population remained low and the planet relatively poor.

_This is perfect,_ Vader grinned as he combed through the information before the coins he'd fed the machine ran out. _All I have to do it acquire a little more funding and hitch a ride off this rock. No problem at all…_

After getting map print-outs for the nearby districts, he gathered up what change he had left from the fountain and moved on. He made his way from the Middle City – where he'd found the kiosk – and headed down to the Lower City, bordering on the Undercity. There he would find small street games of chance and gambling houses where he could expand his collection of coins into some real hard credit. And with real money, he could go anywhere…

* * *

Mara Jade sat in a grimy cantina, sipping at her drink, and bored out of her mind. She'd spent all her time seeking a contact that could get her into the Rebels, but so far had come up empty. If she didn't make any headway into infiltrating their organization soon she feared that her Master would grow dangerously impatient…

A drunk man sauntered up to her and tried to hit on her, but she brushed him off with a cold stare that managed to penetrate the alcohol that fogged his brain. With that distraction taken care off, she resumed her covert scanning of the shady establishment. If it was up to her, she wouldn't go near this seedy bar, but to find a criminal one had to go where the criminals congregated.

Just thinking about the filthy Rebels made her blood boil. They murdered and terrorized innocent civilians and military personnel indiscriminately and did whatever they could to undermine her Master's rule. She wanted nothing more than to exterminate the vermin once and for all.

But her orders were to join their ranks and get close to one of the worst criminals of them all. She had to befriend Luke Skywalker, perhaps even seduce him. And he had to find Vader, the traitorous dog.

_Just you wait, Vader!_ she thought darkly. _You'll pay for betraying my Master and the Empire! My Master does not tolerate such disloyalty and disrespect!_

A rough-looking spacer woman settled down beside her at the bar counter and ordered a drink. Mara eyed her cautiously before planting seeds that would hopefully lead her in a good direction. So she struck up a conversation with a pack of filthy lies.

"If only I could get my hands on that decrepit old bastard," she muttered as if to herself. _Sorry Master!_

The woman glanced at her briefly in mild interest before returning to her drink.

"Or at least one of those lousy rats that licks his boots," she added bitterly. "Moff Vermo would be nice."

"The Empire given you trouble?" the woman asked disinterestedly.

"Put me out of business and killed most of my family," she lied, "labeled them traitors!"

"Heard that one before," the woman grunted. "Same stories, just different names an' faces."

Mara muttered some angry curse on the Empire into her drink while she struggled to control a surge of disgust. The only people against the Empire were criminals and they deserved whatever misery they got. And being scum and degenerates they of course exaggerated their tales of misfortune. It was thoroughly disgusting and she hated doing it herself.

"What sort of business were you in?" the woman asked.

"Freelance security," Mara answered. "Setting up systems, testing systems, body-guarding, that sort of thing."

"Hm," the woman muttered thoughtfully. "Any interest in getting a stab back at the Empire?"

"Definitely," Mara replied, doing her best to sound more angry than excited.

The woman nursed her drink for several minutes before replying. "If you mean that, come to the Black Mynock tomorrow night and we'll talk more."

"Sure thing," Mara nodded sullenly and put all her focus on her drink.

The unnamed woman left shortly after that.

Alone, Mara smiled into her glass. _Now I'm getting somewhere!_

* * *

Vader strode confidently through the deserted streets on Vjun. What once had been a thriving city was now a ghost town. And it was all thanks to one man's stupidity.

Some years before the outbreak of the Clone Wars, the Viscount Malreaux had performed experiments on midi-chlorians. These experiments led the entire population of Vjun to insanity and they murdered each other. Now the planet, once famous for its finely woven tunics and infamous for its acid rains, was abandoned.

Well, mostly abandoned.

On Taris, he'd managed to find a crew of smugglers who used Vjun as a hideout on occasions. With a healthy bribe, he'd convinced them to allow him along with them, fabricating the excuse that he was going treasure hunting on the desolate, nearly plantless, planet. While they told him that there was nothing left to find, they took his money and humored him and he silently laughed at the fools.

In a sense, he would be treasure hunting.

Not long after his transformation from Jedi to Sith, the Emperor had granted him a residence on Vjun—a refuge away from the crowded world of Coruscant that was bathed in the echoes of murderous slaughter. Above the capital city was Bast Castle, the residence given as a gift. During the rare lull in hunting Jedi or hunting Rebels or cutting through the deadly intrigue of the Imperial Court he would retreat to the castle to brood and plot. And he stored a great deal of "treasure" in this distant home.

He quickly left the ghost city and the smuggler crew behind and hiked towards the distant bulk of the castle. It had a broad slopping base that gradually rose up into a tight cluster of spires and one thick tower. The place was imposing and dreary—made more so by the ugly yellowish clouds that perpetually hung low overhead. He sensed no imminent acid rain on the way, but the weather could change quickly and he wasted no time. It was silly to have survived so much only to be caught out in the deadly rain and dissolved into goo.

The ground was barren of most vegetation, due to the destructive precipitation, and rocky. It was rather like Tatooine with a lot of nasty clouds. It was a comparison that commonly came to his mind, and it irritated him. But beggars couldn't be choosers and there were resources in Bast Castle that he needed to access if he was to enjoy continued survival and independence.

Just as he was getting the feeling that rain was on the way, he reached the nearest entrance—a recessed doorway in the side of the cliff that the castle was perched upon. Punching in the necessary code with shaking fingers, he staggered inside and collapse just behind the door. The hike had only been a few miles and he was exhausted. It was a stark reminder of how physically weak he still was.

As soon as he caught his breath and was able to drag himself to his feet, he trudged deeper into the bowels of the castle. He didn't dare stay here any longer than he absolutely had to. This residence was a gift from Palpatine and it was surely being monitored now that he was an outlaw. It was so distant from the Core that there was no way that Palpatine would permanently station anyone here to guard it, but now that he had used his codes to get in he was sure that some automated signal had gone to Coruscant to warn the rotten corpse of his presence there.

Bast Castle was massive and it was dangerous. After moving in, he'd renovated many hallways and entryways to suit his ugly moods. There were booby-traps everywhere—pit traps covered by holographic floors, automated laser turrets, ray shields, and many other deadly obstacles to any intruder who dared sneak in…or any guest who strayed from where they were supposed to be.

Firstly, he headed for the kitchen for food. There wasn't much available as he'd always been restricted by his health problems when he'd lived here. Most of what he lived on had been liquefied nutrition, soups, and gruels. But the simplistic cook droids had been able to whip him up something decent that he could chew on.

Slightly reenergized by his meal, he took to wandering the dark, deadly halls of his old sanctuary as he mulled over what he needed and what he needed to do.

He needed money as most of what he'd picked up on Taris had been used to buy his passage to Vjun. With all of his bank accounts frozen, he couldn't electronically access most of the vast wealth he'd acquired as Palpatine's top minion. However, coming from a lawless planet like Tatooine which had no real banks, he was used to saving up actual hard currency and squirreling it away in various hiding places. So in Bast Castle he had several small vaults with various types of currency stored inside.

He needed transportation since he wasn't about to hop back into the smuggling ship with the almost-pirates that had brought him to the planet. This problem was also easily solved in his visit to the castle. The building possessed a large hanger where he stored many of the small ships he'd acquired over the years. There was a backup _Lambda_-class shuttle, a few other hyper-capable shuttles, and various hyperdrive-enabled fighters. All he had to do was pick one, load it up with supplies, and then he could leave whenever he wanted.

He needed a weapon to defend himself in case trouble managed to find him. To occupy his time on Vjun, he'd built several lightsabers in addition to the one he primarily used. And in addition to those, he kept all of his trophies from his Jedi hunts here. All the blades of the Jedi that he hadn't turned over to Palpatine were hung on a wall like preserved animal heads.

And he needed some new clothes. That was likely to be his only problem that he couldn't solve here. When he was out of his life support suit in the specially-constructed pressurized wing of the castle, he usually only wore under-shorts and a bathrobe as he was the only living soul allowed in those areas. He really didn't have any clothes lying around that he could use.

_I'll just have to buy some new ones on whatever planet I visit next,_ he decided and set his course for the lightsaber room. He'd been without a lightsaber for too long, leaving him with the vague feeling of somehow being naked. With a lightsaber hilt hanging from his belt, he'd feel immensely better about everything.

Vader took a meandering route, carefully avoiding the booby-trapped halls, and made it into the work-out area. Slipping through the training areas, filled with spherical remotes and deactivated dueling-droids, he headed right for the storage and trophy room in the very back. The chamber was dimly lit and filled with gleaming weapons—kept dust-free by a dedicated compliment of maid-droids.

He reached for one of his spare blades…but froze when something out of place caught his eye. It was a package, wrapped in brightly-colored gift paper, with a note tacked on it. Eyeing it warily, he snatched off the note and read it over.

_Hey Uncle D!_

_ I don't know when you'll get this—you've dropped off the face of the galaxy lately—but I'm sure that you'll like it! I was poking through the Imperial Palace one day when I found this hidden room and I found Luke Skywalker's old lightsaber! You know, the one that you said he lost on Bespin? Anyway, I swiped it for you. Happy birthday!_

_ —Jix_

_ P.S. – Skywalker's hand was in a jar there too, but it was really creepy so I just incinerated it._

Vader stared at the note for a long time before crushing it into a ball and dumping it on the floor—the cleaning droids would dispose of it. Wrenga Jixton was his single best agent, and being that such good help was hard to find in the Empire, he had little choice but to tolerate the Corellian's very eccentric behavior. The man's skills and information were excellent, but his habit of addressing him as "Uncle D" was…irritating.

Rolling his eyes, he tore off the gift paper and opened the package to get at the lightsaber. On Bespin, he hadn't really looked at his son's weapon. His focus had been on the boy, on his face and his mood, nothing else. Now he was decidedly curious to see his child's first blade.

What he found in the box made him freeze in startled recognition. It was not Luke's first weapon, but his last Jedi weapon. It was the weapon that Kenobi had run off with on Mustafar while he'd lain burning on the obsidian shore. Luke had had it.

Shaking himself, he took the hilt out of the box and hooked it onto his belt and tossed the box and torn paper to the floor as well. He turned and regarded his trophy wall as he determined to take a second blade as a backup. There were dozens of hilts to choose from—and these were just the weapons that he'd kept for himself, he'd killed so many more…

In the end, he settled on the one blade that held the most significance for him. Kenobi had run off his Jedi saber on Mustafar, now Vader determined to take the dead Kenobi's blade along. It was a sign of his superiority over the old man, and perhaps it would piss off the ghost of the man in his dreams.

Now properly armed, he headed for the hanger to select his transport. Even the smallest of his shuttles were a bit too large for his taste; he wanted something easy to hide. He considered the various models of TIE fighter, but discarded them. Without his life support suit, he'd need a pressure suit to be able to fly the nimble fighters. That left only one real option.

To fulfill his early missions as a Sith, Palpatine had given him a modified Eta-2 – the last model of Jedi starfighter – that had been painted black to suit his new persona. Once the TIE prototypes were being developed, he'd abandoned the fighter that he'd associated with the Jedi in favor of the new design. He hadn't touched the Jedi fighter since then. He'd barely even looked at it.

He warily approached the craft and traced his fingers over the flight surfaces of the gray and black-painted ship. As he walked around to the Astromech socket, the black trimmed droid still seated in it, always ready for deployment, sprang to life for the first time in over a decade. It warbles a string of confused notes as it noticed him instead of the black figure of the usual Darth Vader.

"Run the diagnostics and make sure that the tank's topped off, Eethree," he ordered. "I want this ship ready for flight as soon as possible."

The black droid, R4-E3, beeped in confusion, but made a sound of assent.

"Good," he nodded sharply and strode out of the hanger to gather up his money and other supplies.

The money didn't take long to assemble. He loaded a large bag with several major currencies along with some precious metals and bits of jewelry that he could pawn. Then he sent a house droid to the hanger with the heavy bag while he checked over his living area for anything else he wanted to take.

Stepping into the pressurized, pure-oxygen environment of his private wing was a decidedly unpleasant experience. Before the place had been comfortable, if sterile. Now he found the air hard to breathe; it made his ears pop and he felt lightheaded.

There wasn't much that he found any desire for as he ran through a quick tour of the rooms and halls. Aside from a few pieces of artwork as decoration and the Spartan furniture, there wasn't much to see. However, in a storeroom he could never remember visiting, he found a few more relics from the past that gave him pause.

Sometime after the initial days of the Purges, Palpatine had cleaned out his old quarters in the Jedi Temple and sent his things to Bast Castle. Vader had been enraged by the boxes of Jedi robes, droid parts, and trinkets, and had ordered the items removed from his presence. Apparently the droids had decided to store them here.

He almost turned around and left at the sight of the boxes. He already had his old lightsaber, Kenobi's lightsaber, and his old Eta-2; he needed no more reminders of his Jedi days. But…

But Luke might appreciate these Jedi relics. He might be able to give some of the things to his son as gifts. These things could win him some trust and affection from his long-lost child. It was more than enough reason to drag the hated junk along. So he called up more house droids and had the boxes sent to the hanger.

Before he returned to the hanger to leave Bast Castle and Vjun behind, he made one final stop. He went to his databank and made copies of all his files. In certain situations, information was more valuable than credits, and since he was unlikely to return to the castle anytime soon – if ever again – it was best that he take what he could.

With his datadisk-filled bag in hand, Vader set about purging his security systems to cover his tracks as best he could. The Emperor would know that he had visited Bast Castle, but hopefully he wouldn't get much of a clue as to what Vader had done during his short stay. There was no sense in leaving the old corpse any clues to follow.

Upon returning to the hanger, he found Eethree trundling around the Eta-2, making an inspection of some of the aft panels. The Astromech moved stiffly, like one of its wheels was stuck. Watching it made Vader cringe. He'd really neglected this ship and its robotic partner. The next time he landed, he needed to give the droid a shot of lubrication.

"So are we good for take-off?" he asked as he jammed the last bag into the crammed cargo compartment.

After closing the last access panel, Eethree chirped an affirmative and awkwardly hefted itself back into its socket.

"Good," Vader muttered and clambered into the spherical cockpit.

The Eta-2 powered up with little problem, though some of the gauges showed less than perfect readings. It would do for now, but the fighter needed a good bit of maintenance before anything became a real problem later. If there wasn't a time limit on his stay on Vjun, he'd do it now, but he didn't dare linger any longer.

As soon as the systems were all warmed up, he pulled back on the stick, leaned on the throttle, and rocketed out into the dreary Vjun sky. The rain he'd sensed earlier had been a short sprinkle, so it didn't hamper his departure. After steeply climbing out of the atmosphere to minimize exposure to the corrosive clouds, he headed for the far edge of the system, swooping close to the other celestial bodies in the system to obfuscate his ion trail.

_Where to go,_ he pondered, _where to go?_

Again he was stymied in his plans by a lack of an ultimate destination. There was simply no place that he could go; all the systems that he was familiar with where either painful to him or Palpatine would expect him to go there. It was a most irritating dilemma.

_Well,_ he decided, punching in a course, _I'll just start with a place I know and go from there…_


End file.
